


Magic and Other Misdemeanours

by Arasei



Category: Gintama, Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/M, I'll tag the other characters and relationships as they appear, Mahoutokoro (Harry Potter)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-16
Updated: 2019-06-24
Packaged: 2019-08-03 01:10:32
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 20,789
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16316246
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Arasei/pseuds/Arasei
Summary: "You're kidding," Sougo states, his voice flat and disbelieving. Around him, he can feel the beginnings of curious stares from the eyes of watchful students burning holes into his back as they pass, but at the moment he isn't given much to care, for if he had indeed heard right —"You? The glutton who blew up her cauldron in Potions last week because she tried to addsoy saucein her draught of living death —You,have a date to the Yule Ball?"Kagura looks him up and down with great air of superiority."Jealous, sadist?" she smirks."Fuck no. I'm asking because St Mungo's might be missing a runaway patient."—Harry Potter AU, set in the Japanese wizarding school, Mahoutokoro





	1. Sougo - 5th Year

On the occasional less than satisfying day (of which there are often many), when either everything bad happens at once, or absolutely nothing happens at all, there are one of five things Sougo can do to cheer himself up.

The first; jinx Hijikata-san.

The second; jinx Hijikata-san.

And the third; jinx Hijikata-san. For no matter how reproachfully Kondou or his sister scold him afterwards, the look of pure outrage the older boy sends his way as he uncontrollably dances and trips over his own legs in the Main Hall is worth any lecture and/or the twenty following detentions.

Equally as exciting as the performance of a well cast tarantallegra spell is flying. Rain or shine, the brittle wind that beats his face and tangles in his hair is heaven. In the sky, there are no limits — his broom turns at the slightest touch, each rise and fall is measured and controlled, and on his Ichimonji Seven-Eighty, fifty feet above the ground, he's the master of his own fate.

But the fifth and final option from Sougo's list of surefire pick-me-ups — nothing compares. Hijikata could shit a bucket's worth of breakfast, lunch, and dinner midway through class and it would _still_ come second to being the direct cause of Kagura's face contorting and twisting into an expression of the greatest possible disgust. All he has to do is catch her eye.

Fifth year, however, brings with it an entire new way of going all out.

They've been at it for several minutes, struggling in the space created for them by the lucky crowd happening to witness another of their glorious brawls. Having long since discarded their wands, the fight has mostly degraded into a childish battle of biting, punching, and kicking whatever bit of each other they can, rolling violently back and forth in a spectacle of limbs and flying robes amid the usual shouts of _fight! fight! fight!_

"Die!" Kagura shrieks, viciously clawing at his eyeball.

Sougo grabs a handful of vermillion hair and yanks. "You first!"

It is, in his fine opinion, a brilliant ending to what has otherwise been a pretty shit day.

Until—

_"Protego!"_

Sougo feels himself be blasted backwards by an invisible wall, skidding a few meters across the floor before coming to a stop at the edge of the crowd. From her indignant shout, it's safe to assume Kagura has received the same treatment.

"Gin-chan, let me at him!" he hears her roar from some distance away. "I'm not done yet!"

Sakata Sensei hauls Kagura up by the collar of her robe. "You're done, brat," he says, his face expressionless underneath the usual shock of white hair.

Sougo gets to his feet with a disguised wince, ruefully massaging his chest. He can feel his left eye beginning to swell, but Kagura is suffering from a nosebleed and he can't help but feel a little pleased. Her expression darkens even further at Sougo's satisfied grin.

"See?!" she hollers, wildly struggling in Sakata's grip. "Look at him smiling, the bastard! Gin-chan, he took thirty points off Seiran for me breathing, did you know?!"

"It was ten," Sougo corrects, and he hears several scandalised grunts from Kagura's fellow housemates in the watching crowd. "But I wish I made it thirty."

Sakata rolls his eyes. "With me, Sofa-kun," he says, and has to drag Kagura by the arm so she does not escape and try another attack. They are marched past the crowd and through the school to their empty Defensive Arts classroom, where they are led into the explosion of mess that is Sakata's office.

With a lazy flick of his wand, their teacher conjures two cushions before a low desk alongside the end of the room, the surface littered with parchment scrolls, Jump magazines, calligraphy brushes, and empty strawberry milk cartons. "Sit," he points, and strides over to the cabinet beside the desk without sparing them a glance. 

Sougo and Kagura share a mutual, disgusted glare, but reluctantly oblige, settling as far away from each other as they can in their respective cushions. Meanwhile, Sakata rummages around the cabinet and reemerges with a battered box. 

He moves to the sunken hearth set in the middle of the room and spoons out a handful of glittering dust from the wooden casket in his hand, unceremoniously tipping the powder into the pit. The hearth explodes to life. 

"Tatsuma," he calls into the sudden upsurge of green fire, "Get your ass up here."

The unruly head of Sougo's Astrology teacher appears among the flames, sporting his usual cheerful expression and lopsided sunglasses. "Kintoki!" he beams. "If this is about Otose's firewhiskey, you know I didn't take it—"

"It's Gintoki, bastard, and everybody knows you did. But forget it; this is about something else."

Sakamoto looks curiously past him and spots Sougo sitting by the desk. "Oh, it's Okita-kun, ahaha! What're you doing there—"

"JUST GET UP HERE!"

Sakamoto's head begins to spin and a second later, his whole body emerges from the hearth. He steps out of the pit, dusting ash from his robes. "There was no need to yell, Kintoki, ahaha! You could've just said so."

Sakata's expression is an uncanny resemblance of Kagura's when he smacks Sakamoto upside the head. "Look at this! I was only halfway through this week's Jump when I had to leave to break up _their_ —" he points accusingly in Sougo and Kagura's direction— "stupid fight! Control your students better, you shitty head of house!"

"Ahaha! Kintoki, you're so funny. Aren't you head of House Seiran? Shouldn't you also be controlling your students better?"

Sakata scowls. "My kid didn't try to take fifty points off of another house for somebody breathing."

"It was ten, Sensei," Sougo says again, and Kagura kicks him from her seat.

Sakata waves a hand. "Fine. But fifty points from Toppuu, Souichirou-kun. Sakamoto can set your detention."

"That's not fair, Kintoki! If that's the case, then I'll also take fifty from Seiran!"

"No way — your kid started this. Sixty points from Toppuu."

"Eighty points from Seiran, ahaha!"

"A hundred and thirty points from Toppuu!"

"Ahaha, a hundred and _sixty_ points—"

"TWO HUNDRED POINTS!"

Sougo looks longingly to the door, thinking an afternoon of boredom might've actually been better than antagonizing Kagura and having to put up with the subsequent consequences. He's contemplating the risk of making a run for it when he hears Kagura cough pointedly in his direction. He glances her way and she smirks, jerking her chin towards the door as if to say, 'do it. I _dare_ you.'

Sougo scowls. There's no way in hell he'll go now.

'Chicken,' she mouths, and Sougo is a second away from tackling her again when he hears Sakata shriek — "ALL POINTS FROM TOPPUU! EVERY SINGLE STINKING POINT YOU SLIMY EELS HAVE GOT, I'M TAKING IT—"

Sougo knows what will come next.

_BOOM!_

Sougo ducks, shielding his eyes. From the explosion of smoke via Sakata's sunken hearth emerges the deputy headmistress of Mahoutokoro, her expression livid underneath a heavy layer of makeup.

"What," she says, "Are you two idiots doing?"

"Ahaha, Otose! We were—"

 _"SHUT UP!"_ Otose roars, and Sougo is almost thrown back in his cushion from the force of it. He briefly meets Kagura's eye, and simultaneously, they clamber with frantic panic to their feet, fighting and stumbling over each other in their race to the sliding door.

" _CHILDREN,_ THE BOTH OF YOU—"

"IT WASN'T ME—"

"—HOUSE COUNTERS ARE GOING _MAD—_ "

Bangs and yells continue to chase them down the hallway as they run, snapping at their heels like gunfire. Pushing through the persistent crowds of students, they barrel past bright wooden classrooms and high, richly painted walls, sandled feet slipping on polished timber floors. It's only when they are a safe distance away that they stop at the end of a wide, paneled corridor, breathless from the exercise in escape. There's a stitch blooming in Sougo's left side, and it's with a relieved wince that he slides down the wall to the cool floor.

"Oi!" Kagura suddenly yelps, almost falling atop him. Sougo looks up, feeling a pressure in his hand and finding it attached tight around Kagura's wrist.

He blinks. "Oh," he says. In the palm of his grip, he feels fine bone and paper thin skin, and in a momentary lapse of coherent thought, he gives her wrist an involuntary, feather light squeeze. Above, he hears Kagura's breath stutter and he blinks again, immediately letting go. He tries not to think too hard about the sudden loss of warmth. "Sorry."

Kagura's hand lingers mid-air, frozen in a semi-state of shock before she comes to her senses and snatches it back, holding her fist to her chest and looking pointedly away. He thinks she might be blushing, but it could just as easily be flush from the exertion of running, so he says nothing.

"I could've run by myself," Kagura mutters. "You did not need to drag me along, yes?"

"You tripped," Sougo points out.

She sharply meets his eye with a glare, her cheeks now definitely aflame. "I did not!"

Sougo takes in the sweat that shines over her brow and the flyaway strands of vermillion hair framing her face, a sight he had only just caught a fleeting glimpse of when she'd accidentally slipped and stumbled into his back around a corner. His fingers twitch, remembering with uncomfortable clarity how natural the instinct had been to reach out and steady her. In the rush to get away, Sougo must have forgotten to let go.

He wrenches his gaze away from the sight of her hair glowing ruby red in the afternoon sunlight and shakes his head. How embarrassing.

"Whatever," he sighs, hauling himself up with a hand pressed against the ebbing stitch at his side. "I'm going."

Kagura's mouth falls open a little. "Where?"

Sougo walks away. "Anywhere."

"That's not fair!" Kagura hollers, chasing after him. "You have not been nearly punished enough, yes? You ruined my day, stupid eel! Pay up immediately!"

He scoffs. "Pay up?"

"Yes! _Immediately!"_

Sougo stops, causing Kagura to once again slam into his back.

"OI—"

"Am I hearing this right, China?" he cuts her off, turning to face her. "You want _money,_ in return for spending quality time with me?"

Her eyes widen, and Sougo is no longer quite able to hide the teasing smirk pulling at the corner of his mouth when he continues, "I'd be careful if I were you. I don't imagine Kamui would be too pleased to hear about his little sister running an escort service—"

Kagura grabs the back of his head with a violent shriek and throws him into a wall. It's only the fast reflexes borne from years of Quidditch practice that just saves him from a broken nose and the loss of his two front teeth, and after managing to catch himself in time, they begin another clumsy battle of pulling cheeks and kicking shins, stumbling along the hallway in a kind of four-legged hop amidst Kagura's incoherent yells of 'pervert!' and 'die!'

Much to Sougo's humiliation and overall discomfort, she wins with a well aimed punch to his stomach. He doubles over, gasping and cursing her existence while she looks down at him proudly. " _Anyway,_ " she says, talking over his well meaning wishes for her death, "I meant take fifty points from your own house, yup. The old lady is sure to fix whatever mess those perm-heads did to the counters, which means Toppuu's house points will also go back to normal. It's totally not fair, yes? I still want compensation!"

Sougo is about to tell her _exactly _where she can stick her compensation when his sight focuses and he notices a commotion at the end of the hallway. "China—" he tries, but Kagura snaps, "Take points off from Seiran again and this time I will break your legs for sure!"__

____

"Not that," Sougo grits between his teeth, straightening as best he can with a bruised gut. He jerks his chin in the direction of the corridor opening. " _That. _"__

______ _ _

Without waiting for Kagura to follow, he peels off from her to see what the noise is all about.

______ _ _

Distracted though Sougo was, it was a wonder he didn't notice sooner how their running had brought them all the way to the Entrance Hall. From the top of the grand, white jade staircase, he watches chaos unfold in the foyer below.

______ _ _

"What was that you said about the old lady fixing the counters, China?" he calls behind him. Kagura grudgingly catches up to him, peering around Sougo with reluctant curiosity. Her jaw drops.

______ _ _

The Entrance Hall is filled to the brim with students clustered around the four stone bowls that make up Mahoutokoro's house counters, gasping and yelling in both horrified and excited intervals as they watch grey, blue, and pale green petals spin and twirl with frantic disarray above their respective bowls, looking as if caught in a miniature hurricane. Tsukuyo Sensei is stationed at the forefront of it all, seemingly trying to maintain the crowd but with little success.

______ _ _

"Everybody back to your activities!" she yells. "Whatever you were doing before you decided to block off the Entrance Hall, get back to it!"

______ _ _

Sougo thinks that Tsukuyo's words would probably have more effect if they weren't punctuated with the occasional avid glance behind her, no doubt updating herself on who so far was winning.

______ _ _

He sighs, amused. "You'd think our own Deputy Headmistress would be above such petty rivalry. What has Mahoutokoro come to?"

______ _ _

Kagura hums shortly, a frown tugging at her mouth as she watches the progression of Seiran's fluttering grey petals. "I forgot she was also head of Yosamu. Gin-chan must be fighting really hard." 

______ _ _

The girl proceeds to shoot Sougo a dirty look. "You know that this is all your fault, yes?"

______ _ _

Sougo leans against the wall and looks to the ceiling in what is surely an infuriatingly nonchalant gesture. "Is it? I don't remember."

______ _ _

The taunt works. Rising up in a swell of fury, Kagura jabs a finger to his chest and shouts, "You know it was! School started only a week ago and already you are drunk on the power of the Student Council, yes? Taking away points for breathing — Gin-chan is right! Idiots in authority are a danger to society!"

______ _ _

He smirks and tucks his hands into his sleeves. "In that case, we can rest assured. It'll be a cold day in hell when you're appointed as member of the Council, after all."

______ _ _

Kagura's fuming scowl curls into a sneer. "As if I would _ever_ want to be a stupid dog of the school."

______ _ _

Sougo shrugs, his gaze drifting disinterestedly. "It's just as well. I'd hate to see what would become of our beloved Mahoutokoro if we gave its biggest idiot a position of control." 

______ _ _

Across him, Kagura reels back in outraged offence. "You—" she begins and stops, her mouth opening and closing in a furious, silent diatribe. Unable to form a coherent enough expression, she screams in frustration and even goes as far as to stamp her foot, almost cracking the wooden planks underneath her heel. Sougo waits, already grinning; his patience isn't tested for long. In the affronted pause that follows Kagura's tantrum, she finally comes to a decision. "Fine," she snaps, and steps back to point dramatically between his eyes. " _Fine!_ Challenge accepted! Next year, I will be sent an invitation to join the Council and you'll eat your words, yes?! We'll see who's the idiot then!"

______ _ _

He relaxes his smile into a leisurely drawl. "Oh? Don't forget — Headmaster Baka only makes those at the top of their class part of the council, and... well." He glances down at the pink of her robes and smirks. "Kamui tells me the only thing worse than your grades is your smell."

______ _ _

Kagura scoffs. "As if I will let something like homework stop me. You do _your_ best not to forget, Okita Sougo," she says, fixes upon him her most determined glare. "I will stop at nothing to ensure I beat you and your dumb house! And _that,"_ she spits, "is a promise!"

______ _ _

And with a final scowl, she spins on her heel and storms away.

______ _ _

Sougo watches her go, eyes tracing the bounce of her hair and the heaviness of her step. The scent of crackling fire and summer flowers lingers in the air and he breathes it in, relishing in both it and the echoing remnant of his name rolling from her lips. His grin is electric.

______ _ _

"I look forward to it, China."

______ _ _

In the palace of Mahoutokoro, it's a beautiful day.

______ _ _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OKAY! SO!
> 
> This was a Hogwarts AU. _Was._ As in, this fic was definitely, originally set in Hogwarts. But things happen. Things like finding out we have an actual, established Japanese wizarding school in canon, courtesy of JKR herself. No biggie. (I'm not freaking out or anything, nope).
> 
> For some backstory, the Mahoutokoro School Of Magic is located on the mountainous island Minami Iwo Jima. Wizarding children are invited to attend Mahoutokoro - an ornate and beautiful palace made of white jade - as early from the age of seven to participate in the school's day student program (much like normal schools). They may board at the school starting from age eleven. Students are given enchanted robes, which gradually change color according to their grades, starting from pale pink and eventually becoming gold, should they reach the top of their class. (link to see a fan example of what their robes look like - NOT MY ART - can be found here: https://www.deviantart.com/eyugho/art/Mahoutokoro-And-Hogwarts-618868910).
> 
> That's about all of JKR's canon information. Everything from here on out (including classes, house names, and house points) are based on fan headcanons other people have made, and a few headcanons of my own.
> 
> In regards to the houses, a Mahoutokoro wikia made by the fandom suggests four houses by the names of Seiran, Yosamu, Toppuu, and Shunrai. To those of you who wished to see something like Gryffindor!Kagura and Slytherin!Sougo, don't worry! The characteristics of these houses more or less correspond with Hogwarts' own.
> 
> TO CLARIFY - THE HOUSE NAMES, THEIR SYMBOLS, TRAITS, AND COLORS, ARE NOT OF MY OWN INVENTION! THEY BELONG TO THE WRITERS OF THE MAHOUTOKORO WIKIA WHICH CAN BE FOUND AT THIS LINK: http://mahotokoro.wikia.com/wiki/Houses_Overview
> 
> With that said, here is a comprehensive list of the traits that define each house and who I made their head:
> 
> House Seiran - Intuitive. Straightforward. Protective.  
> \- Gintoki
> 
> House Yosamu - Patient. Adaptive. Honest.  
> \- Otose
> 
> House Toppu - Observant. Ambitious. Quick-witted.  
> \- Sakamoto
> 
> House Shunrai - Curious. Unpredictable. Confident.  
> -Gengai
> 
> As you'll probably gather, in order, their respective Hogwarts counterparts would be Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Slytherin, and Ravenclaw, which means that despite being set in an entire new school, we still get that Gryffindor!Kagura and Slytherin!Sougo dynamic I'm sure we all love and cherish ;)
> 
> ALSO! This story follows the Class 3Z format, meaning characters who were teachers in the 3Z universe are also teachers here, and vice versa for students (e.g. Zura is a student despite being in canon, the same age as Gin and Sakamoto who are teachers). I did decide, however, to shake things up a bit in terms of year groups. Kagura is 14 in canon, where Sougo is 18. I wanted to kind of keep that age gap, so here in this fic, ages are condensed - Kagura is one year below Sougo, Hijikata and Zura are two years above him, Kondou is one year above them, etcetera etcetera. It's confusing, but with more chapters, I think you guys will get the hang of it.
> 
> As this fic is also a collection of random oneshots (not limited to Okikagu btw), there will be timeline jumps every chapter according to the story behind each oneshot. To sort these out, the title of each chapter will list the POV from which it is narrated from, and the year that person is in during that specific oneshot. The ages of the other characters will revolve around the 'narrator' of that chapter.
> 
> And phew. I think that's it! This first chapter was more of an introductory opening. The next few will have some more world building and definitely introduce classes as well as other Gintama characters! I haven't decided houses for everybody yet, so if you have some personal headcanons or preferences you want to share, I'd be honored to hear them!
> 
> I hope you're as excited to see the rest of the Gintama cast in upcoming chapters as I am! Thanks for reading! I hope to see you in the next one :D
> 
> \- Arasei


	2. Katsura - 3rd Year

The umbrella is cheap, its handle made of hard plastic and colored in a way that only faintly suggests beech wood rather than implies it. The fabric is similarly unremarkable, an ordinary shade of pale pink plainly decorated in a pattern of baby blue flowers. In summary, it shouldn't mean anything more than the object that it is, but since it first entered his possession, Katsura has treasured it all the same.

He turns the umbrella over in his hands and restlessly hops between each foot as he waits. What should he say upon returning it to its owner? _Hi, this is your umbrella from last time. Hi, thanks for your umbrella. Hi, remember me? Last month, you let me borrow your umbrella—_

"Excited, Zura?"

Katsura jumps and turns to see Takasugi sidling up beside him in line for the torii gate. He hurriedly schools his expression into that of indifference and moves the umbrella out of the other boy's sight. "Not especially. I'm just tired of waiting in line."

Takasugi grins, all sharp teeth and dangerous pretense. "Is that so? I could've sworn you I heard you muttering something just then. Rehearsing for when you come face to face with your munousha girl?"

Katsura resists the urge to pull back Takasugi's eye-patch and release it against his face with a satisfying snap. "What are you doing here, Takasugi? Weren't you banned from all further trips to Kabukicho?"

The other boy rolls his eye and jabs a thumb over his shoulder. "Bansai wants to visit the record shop; something about Terakado Tsu. I'm only here to drop him off." He purses his mouth in mocking gesture. "Can't I say hello to an old friend if I see him?"

Katsura frowns. "Poke fun, you mean."

Takasugi shrugs. "That too." He catches sight of the umbrella held in Katsura's hand. “A token of affection from your lover?”

“She is _not_ my lover.”

“Who’s not your lover?” asks a new voice. Katsura swears and almost drops the umbrella. If he were not already aware that apparating within palace grounds was impossible, he would’ve thought Sakata Sensei had appeared behind Takasugi out of thin air. 

“The ramen girl, Sensei,” Takasugi inputs helpfully, without so much as having even flinched. “You know — the munousha Zura's been talking about.”

Sakata taps his chin. “Oh, Ikumatsu. Nice girl. She's far too pretty for somebody like Zura.”

“Sensei!”

Takasugi's grin is positively shit-eating in face of Katsura's mortification, and it's with immense satisfaction that he watches his friend's expression fall when Sakata drops a heavy hand onto his shoulder. “Not that it’s any of your business, Bakasugi. What was the plan, huh? Convince Zura to sneak you through the gate?”

“I would never,” Katsura says for him. “And it’s not Zura, either. It’s Katsura!”

“Don’t lie, Zura. You’re just as much of a terror as he is.”

"Am _not."_

Takasugi scowls and shakes off Sakata’s hand, his previous good mood gone. “How’d you even know I was here?”

“I’m your Defensive Arts teacher,” Sakata says, moving to block Hijikata and Kondou from view as they smugly wave from where they stand further along the back of the line. “I have my own tricks.”

“Whatever. I set fire to the Main Hall _one time—_ “

“And the Entrance hall?"

Takasugi scowls. "Accident."

Katsura grins. “What about the Student Council room?”

"That was _you._ " 

“Don't forget the library," Sakata prompts. 

"And the Dojo."

“Our singing maple grove—“

“—Seiran Observatory—“

“—Gengai's office—“

“—Headmaster Baka’s office—”

__

“— _my_ office—“

__

“ _Alright!"_ Takasugi snaps. “I get it.”

__

"Then you'll also get that it's time for your, oh—" Sakata pretends to check the imaginary watch around his wrist, "fifty-fourth detention."

__

Katsura makes a face. "A watch doesn't help you keep count of detentions."

__

"It does when it's funny," Sakata replies coolly, and he nudges Takasugi along. "C'mon, Bakasugi. Another keukegen showed up in my office and its been tearing the room up into shreds. I'll consider your detention complete if you manage to get rid of it before Zura comes back."

__

Takasugi follows Sakata with sullen reluctance. "It's your fault they keep showing up. Gedoumaru Sensei told us they only manifest where there's trash, and your office is disgusting."

__

"Oh? Then once you get rid of the damn thing, you can spend the rest of your detention cleaning the room up."

__

"That's not fair!"

__

A new round of yelling starts while they trek up the hill, thankfully becoming harder for Katsura to hear the further they walk away. He moves up ahead in the line with relief, although the feeling is short lived. Without somebody to argue with, his mind wanders again to the ramen stall, and absently, he finds himself resuming his earlier nervous fiddling with the umbrella.

"Next!" he hears Hattori Sensei call from where he's stationed next to the torii. Katsura looks around the line and sees his Charms teacher write a note on the parchment scroll floating by his arm. Behind him, the gate's bright red pillars frame the picturesque view of their bank of land cutting off at the edge of a wide crescent bay, the mountainous hills on the other side branching out into open sea.

His agitation forgotten, Katsura eagerly watches as the student at the forefront of the line breaks away and walks through the gate. For a moment, the air around the girl ripples like disturbed water, and a second later, she disappears.

Katsura jitters with excitement. His grandmother despised travelling by torii — in her opinion, to use the entrances of Shinto shrines as a means of transportation was an abominable desecration of sacred space, no matter how strictly the Japanese Ministry of Magic maintained their list of gates not be enchanted; for this reason, Katsura had never before traveled by such means. It came as welcome surprise to hear that third year students had the privilege of visiting the wizarding town of Kabukicho toward the end of every month, and that furthermore, they would be making use of the school's own personal gate to go back and forth between their island and the Japanese mainland. 

The line progresses, and soon, Katsura is next to enter. Hattori scans the floating scroll. "Katsura, Katsura.... Oh. Here we go." He makes another note next to what Katsura assumes is his name. "Don't burn anything down while you're there."

Katsura hides a smile behind his hand and steps up to the gate. Up close, he can see it borders the very edge of the bank, a reminder that should the enchantment fail as he passes through, he would plunge right into the bay. The water level isn't so low that the fall would hurt, but the thought itself is more than embarrassing, and he finds himself tightening his grip around the umbrella for moral support. Cautiously, he moves his foot past the pillars of the torii, puffing out a breath of relief when the air around his ankle shimmers and moves, and with newfound confidence, he steps over the edge of the bay and through the gate.

Travelling between torii, though uncomfortable, is a sensation that never fails to thrill Katsura. The passing of what he imagines to be an invisible barrier feels rather like wading through heavy cream, thick and pressing in both weight and substance. Though suffocating, for a brief moment, his surroundings are neither dark nor light, but blank in existence, and Katsura happily absorbs the view with the same fervor he does knowledge.

All too soon, his hands breach the other side of the gate, the rest of his body following after in a clumsy stumble. An arm reaches out to catch his elbow, roughly saving him from an uncomfortable fall. 

"Careful," says a woman's voice, and Katsura lets himself be steadied with strong grip. He throws a glance behind him, seeing only the dilapidated shrine that marks Kabukicho's exclusive torii. Mahoutokoro is nowhere to be found, and his stomach flips with the delight of yet another successful travel. He looks up and grins at his rescuer. "Thanks, Sensei."

Tsukuyo lets him go, the smoke from her pipe curling along with her smile. "You had better get going. I hear you've got a date."

Katsura almost chokes. "It's not a date!"

The woman chuckles, waving him off in the direction of the town. "Go on then."

Flushing through a half-hearted glare, he reluctantly follows in the direction she points. 

The narrow path down from the Shinto shrine is bordered by a lush green forest, the ground dappled in golden sunlight. The sweet, summer weather is a far contrast to the kind he suffered in his last visit to Kabukicho, and with a frown, he recalls electric air and raindrops the size and weight of bullets. Further along the trail, he can vaguely hear the echoes of voices casually discussing plans over which shop to visit first, no doubt belonging to students who had entered the gate before him.

Eventually, the forest begins to cease in density, and soon, it feathers out onto a hill overlooking Kabukicho. Spread wide over the valley, the province is a bright and colorful town of wizarding shops, homes, and specks of people decked in all manners of robes. Even the buildings, packed together in such a way that suggests they were haphazardly built on top of each other rather than around, exude magic in their spectacular fusion of tiled roof and signs. From this distance, Katsura can't quite make out Ikumatsu's stall, but the view of Kabukicho shakes him up all the same.

He takes his time in making his way down, following the small crowd of Mahoutokoro students up until the town entrance, at which point he breaks off to weave his own way through the maze of streets and stalls. 

Every now and then, he pauses to stop and stare through the occasional shop window, and several times, he catches himself walking past a store boasting a collection of the most exceptional blades he has ever seen. Catching in the light, each katana gleams from their respective stand, tagged with notes reading such things as, '30 BC, owned by Aosamagari the Singing Fox,' and '??? AD, the Cherry Blossom Blade — CURSED ITEM! PRICE NEGOTIABLE.' 

It takes an arduous exercise in strength to finally move on, and Katsura lets himself be distracted by stalls selling pre-made shikigami papers and shops auctioning cursed mirrors.

After half an hour of wandering, he finds the stall tucked between two others selling color-changing dango and wooden voodoo dolls, the inviting smell of ramen taunting his stomach. Behind the store flaps, Katsura sees a white uniform moving about and his heartbeat quickens. He carefully goes over again the perfect greeting in his mind, twisting the umbrella in his hands, and taking a deep breath, he ducks underneath the flaps.

The white uniform is nowhere to be seen. 

Along the counter, there is neither customer nor server on either side, the stall empty save for him and the smell of ramen cooking on the stove. Katsura's shoulders fall in disappointment — perhaps he had only imagined the flash of white. 

He bites his lip, looking down at the umbrella before coming to a decision and stepping forward to leave it on the counter. She would know it was from him anyway.

At that moment, the counter jerks upward with a sharp thud. "Ouch!" a voice hisses, and Katsura's eyes widen.

A blonde head emerges from underneath the counter's other side, accompanied by a pale hand reaching up to gingerly rub at a spot on the scalp. "Stupid box," mutters a girl, and the sound of something being kicked reverberates throughout the stall. The owner of the voice straightens, and sensing a customer, she looks up — and freezes upon registry of the person standing before her. 

All of a sudden, the polished, practiced words Katsura had so painstakingly remembered falls flat. "M-Merry Christmas!" he says, and slams the umbrella down on the counter. The girl jumps at the noise, her mouth falling open in surprise at the umbrella's appearance. For almost an entire minute, she stares at the pink of the canopy as if waiting for it to provide an explanation, and finally, when it gives her none, she looks up.

"Katsura-san," Ikumatsu says, and pauses. “Isn’t this my own umbrella?”

There is a long drawn out moment of silence. Katsura looks to the ceiling. 

“No.“

Ikumatsu slams a hand onto the table. “It _is!_ It is my umbrella! Why are you gifting me my own umbrella?! _And—“_ she points to him accusingly, “it’s the middle of June! It’s nowhere _near_ Christmas!”

He coughs into his hand, still avoiding her gaze. “Ikumatsu-dono, you know what they say — you should never mouth off to a gift horse."

Ikumatsu blinks, taken aback. “No, that's wrong.”

"Take what you have for granted."

“Hey, you’re making fun of me, right? Right?”

“Chew on the hand that feeds you."

"That's the _opposite_ of what the saying is meant to be!"

Katsura dares to meet her eye with an amused grin, and she exhales loudly, pinching the bridge of her nose. “You're incorrigible,” she mutters, though she swipes the umbrella off the counter and waves a hand to one of the stools. "Take a seat. _Santa."_

She turns away, but Katsura thinks he catches her struggling to hide a smile. His chest feels warm as he slides into one of the gestured seats. "One soba, please."

Ikumatsu rolls her eyes. "No matter how many times you ask, Katsura-san, this place isn't going to suddenly turn into a soba stall." Tying her hair back into a ponytail, she continues decisively, "you get ramen only."

Katsura leans over the counter. "But think about it, Ikumatsu-dono! It'd be an amazing marketing opportunity; 'Buy one soba, get ramen free.'"

"So in the end I still end up as a soba stall?!"

He blinks innocently and Ikumatsu deflates with an exasperated sigh, deciding against picking a fight and going back to preparing his ramen. "It's not like it'd make any difference. People aren't exactly lining up to be served food by a thirteen year old girl, whether it be ramen or soba."

Katsura tilts his head. "Where are your parents?"

Ikumatsu absently waves a hand. "Busy preparing for the opening of Papa's robe shop. It's just me today."

"Do you need help?"

She throws a smile over her shoulder. "Didn't I say so before? There's no customers here for you to help me with. And even if there was..." she looks wistfully to the bowl of dough along the far end of the counter, "I really only wish I had magic to speed up the process."

Katsura opens and shuts his mouth in silence, vying between words of consolation and that of conviction that magic was overrated. But Ikumatsu had magical parents — she'd know the truth anyway. 

Before he can decide on what to say, Ikumatsu shakes herself out of her reverie. "Anyway," she says, smiling brightly as she sets the bowl of ramen down on the counter before him, "you'll tell me more stories today, won't you?

He follows her lead and picks up a set of chopsticks. "If that's what you wish. I must confess, however, I thought you'd hate hearing about Mahoutokoro."

She shrugs, crossing her arms. "I know I can't go. but I'd rather be able to imagine it than not have a part of it at all."

Katsura stops, his chopsticks hovering over the bowl. "I'm sorry—"

"That I'm a munousha?" Ikumatsu finishes for him with a grin. "Don't be. It's not your fault I was born without magic — it's not anybody's. It just happens to be the card I was dealt with. But it doesn't mean I have to sit here and mope about it." She pauses, and adds, "and I like when you describe it. It feels less like I'm missing out on something and more like I'm there."

He focuses on the bowl, smiling softly. He lowers his hand, and smoothly, the chopsticks slide into the soup. "In that case, I won't do you the disservice of asking once again."

Recalling his earlier argument with Takasugi, he begins by talking of Mahoutokoro's singing maple grove, animatedly describing their golden and silver leaves and of how when a breeze rifles through the branches, one can hear the echoes of collected songs. Smoothing his hands across the table, he illustrates the great, navy dome of Shunrai's planetarium roof and its hundreds of blinking constellations and stars, sparkling as if they would in a true night sky. 

He talks and talks and talks, and with every word, Ikumatsu _glows._ She smiles at the description of the school's wooden, narrow hallways, her eyes widen at the image of rainbow koi swimming beneath History Bridge, and she laughs when Katsura tells her of slipping and sliding across the waxed floors of the Mahoutokoro dojo. 

"And before every lesson, we race to see who can slide across the room the fastest and Sakata Sensei will stand by the opposite wall as an impartial judge to tell us who touched it first." He stops, wrinkling his nose. "Although he's not very impartial at all. Whoever was annoying him the most that day always comes last."

Ikumatsu snorts into the back of her hand, unsuccessfully muffling her giggles. "Is he really your kendo instructor?"

Katsura's expression twists even further, and this time, Ikumatsu freely laughs over the noise of ramen boiling in the background. The sound is magic of an entirely different caliber, beautiful and genuine, and he's sorry to see it fade upon his finishing of the bowl.

When her laughter subsides into the occasional chuckle, she tells him, "next time, I want to hear about the classrooms. The desks, the windows, the _books._ " Her voice is of excitement tinged by wistfulness. "Don't forget a single detail."

Katsura nods seriously. "I promise."

Ikumatsu's expression softens. "Okay."

He slides out of his seat, and waiting until she's put away his bowl, he bows politely. "Thank you, Ikumatsu-dono."

She waves. "Until next time."

He straightens and struggles to return her smile, feeling as though his stomach has suddenly turned into lead. He turns to face the entrance, reaching to push away the store flaps when he hesitates, fingers grazing the edges of the cloth.

"Katsura-san?" he hears Ikumatsu ask. "Is something wrong?"

He makes a decision.

"Ikumatsu-dono," he says, abruptly spinning around. She blinks, taken aback, and Katsura pauses to cough into his hand. "The weather is horrible, don't you think?"

Ikumatsu glances around him, seeing nothing but golden sunlight spilling into the stall behind the overhead flaps. She raises an eyebrow. "Is it?"

Katsura twiddles his fingers and says, "could I wait out the rain here? Just for a little while." He bites his lip and adds, "I was also wondering if I could complain to you a bit more about my teachers. And of how disorganised their classrooms are."

Ikumatsu's eyes widen, and in the surprised lilt of her smile, the stall seems to glow all the more brighter. In the kitchen corner, the waxen pink material of her umbrella shines prettily in the light.

"Alright," she grins. "Just until the rain stops."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know I told some of you that Kamui would appearing in the second chapter, but the next few that I have planned are centered around Okikagu (with Kamui appearances) and I didn't want to start this fic with a bombardment of Sougo and Kagura, so I thought I'd break up my streak with another couple; and I never did get around to writing that lil' Katsumatsu oneshot, so here we are ;D
> 
> Just a tiny note before I sign out — if it wasn't already clear, a munousha is the Japanese equivalent of a squib, somebody born into a wizarding family without magic.
> 
> Also, last chapter, I said that Tsukuyo was head of Shunrai (Mahoutokoro's Ravenclaw counterpart), but since then I've realised that that was a mistake. Tsukki is an absolute Gryffindor (Seiran) through and through, and so Shunrai's new head of house will be Gengai, and I've gone back and edited last chapter's author's note to make this absolutely clear. 
> 
> With that said, sorry for the excessive description in this chapter. I realise that we only got to the Katsumatsu towards the end, but I really wanted to do some world building and apparently I'm incapable of controlling myself (no surprise there). Regardless, I hope you liked it anyway and that you're looking forward to the next chapter! We will finally be having the Yule Ball oneshot from the fic summary, and there will be a lot of fluffy shenanigans, so stay tuned!
> 
> \- Arasei


	3. Sougo - 4th Year

In another universe, Sougo thinks he might enjoy a white Christmas.

In that life, where perhaps all he knows is the weight of a sword and the sting of split skin, maybe snow comes as something of a relief; a balm to wash away the sin of red. It would be magic of a whole other scope and scale, the way a snowflake might land on his tongue and coldly burn away the taste of rusted copper. 

Fortunately or unfortunately, however, he doesn’t live in that universe; he lives in this one. And in this life, he agonizes over the first snowfall of each year.

"I can’t stand to see you alone and upset in the corner of the room every year, Sou-chan. This time, you must bring a girl!” 

He sighs. If it were anybody else, Sougo would’ve already been growling, snapping, and cursing all the way to the furthest reaches of the planet. If it were anybody else.

“I don’t need a date, Aneue,” he reminds his sister firmly. “I’m only upset because it’s the _Yule Ball._ It’s disgusting. Everybody knows it’s just an excuse for the teachers to get drunk and for… well.”

Mitsuba blinks and Sougo damns the idea of Hijikata’s very existence. “Never mind. Anyway, the only reason I ever go is for you — every other year, I’d have taken the first torii gate home.”

Across from him, Mitsuba’s face falls. “You really hate it that much?”

Sougo opens his mouth but stops, debating his options. He can tell her the truth, tell her he’d rather set himself on fire then go to his fourth Yule Ball, and Mitsuba would set her jaw and make up her mind. They would both go back to Bushu for the holidays, clean up their tiny house at the edge of town, dust between the rafters, and pull out the space heater they keep deep within the kitchen closet. The rest of their winter break would be spent looking up traditional Japanese recipes and attempting to make custard and colored rice before they inevitably fail and throw everything out, falling back to the usual KFC dinner. 

It’s his idea of a perfect Christmas, the kind they used to have before he turned eleven and they began boarding at school, staying over each holiday for convenience. 

But then, Mitsuba would be upset — and as much as he hates the Yule Ball, he hates seeing her upset even more.

His sister is a hopeless romantic and waits with burning passion for the first snow of each year. Mahoutokoro, a flourishing picture in summer, is a delicate beauty in winter, and stuns in an entirely different way. Not only does it coat the school something radiant in a way Mitsuba simply adores, snow also means the approaching of Christmas, which means the approaching of the annual Yule Ball, which means dancing and laughing and fun and _Hijikata._ Mitsuba looks forward to this every year; and try as she might hide it, she would be devastated about being deprived a Mahoutokoro Christmas. So as much as he hates the Yule Ball—

He’s really left only one option.

“I don’t… _Hate_ it,” he manages. The words feel as if they are being strangled out of his throat.

Mistuba looks up at him, her teeth catching worriedly along her bottom lip. “Really, Sou-chan? You mean it? Because we can go home—”

“I mean it,” Sougo cuts her off with a strained smile, wanting to run headlong into a wall. “And to prove it to you…” (he is really, _really,_ regretting his decision), “…I’ll even find a date for the ball.”

It does the trick. Mitsuba positively lights up. “Oh, Sou-chan! You’d do something like that for me?”

Maybe he’ll throw himself over the balcony of Seiran Observatory when this is all over. “I promise, Aneue. For you.”

Mitsuba looks as if she’s about to cry when she hugs him. Sougo thinks he might cry too, but for an entirely different reason. 

His sister pulls away. “You won’t regret this, Sou-chan!” she beams. “I’m going to go tell Toushirou-san the good news!” 

She gives his hair a final, affectionate ruffle, and hurries off. If she weren’t weighed down by her several layers of coats and scarves, Sougo thinks she might’ve skipped away into the crowd. He looks to the ceiling and contemplates the meaning of life. 

From somewhere behind him, he hears somebody begin to snigger. With Mitsuba gone, they reveal themself from behind the intersecting corridor, and Sougo is met with the offensive colors of pink and red.

“That was painful to watch, yes?” Kagura grins. “Mitsu-nee really has you wrapped around her finger.”

Sougo scowls. “Eavesdropping, China? Who knew you could hit lower than rock bottom.”

Kagura is still smirking as she sniffs and readjusts the book bag over her shoulder. “Whatever. At least _I_ have a date to the ball.”

The proclamation is followed by a long, drawn-out pause. In the seconds that tick by, Sougo evaluates and reevaluates this new and highly unexpected (suspicious) information with increasing incredulity. “You’re kidding,” he says, his voice flat and disbelieving. Around him, he can feel the beginnings of curious stares from the eyes of watchful students burning holes into his back as they pass, but at the moment he isn't given much to care, for if he had indeed heard right —

"You? The glutton who blew up her cauldron in Potions last week because she tried to add _soy sauce_ in her draught of living death — _You,_ have a date to the Yule Ball?" 

Kagura looks him up and down with great air of superiority. 

"Jealous, sadist?" she smirks. 

"Fuck no. I'm asking because St Mungo's might be missing a runaway patient.

Her satisfied grin falls and twists into a scowl. “He’s not insane!”

Sougo scoffs. “Anybody would be if they asked _you_.”

Kagura makes a noise like an angry cat and hits him with her book bag. With each swing, she shouts, “you — are such — a _bastard!”_

Shielding himself from the weight of her bag, he yells back, “better than the date of an escapee from the mental ward!”

She screams and manages a final, powerful hit. Sougo lands painfully on the floor.

Her shoulders jerking up and down in heavy breaths, Kagura re-shoulders her book bag and points between his eyes. "You!" she shouts, and Sougo stares. "You are just a punk chihuahua compared to my date, yes! You are puny and _small,_ and at the Yule Ball, when everybody is having fun and you are alone, I want you to remember this moment, and then— and then—" she pauses, struggling to find an appropriate word, "and— _die!"_

Satisfied, she sticks out her tongue as final insult to injury and stomps off.

For once, Sougo doesn't call out after her retreating back. It's not the first time he's heard those lines, but it's the first they've been said with the implication that somehow, he is not the center of her life, and for some reason or other, it stuns him into silence.

He gets to his feet, ignoring the whispers from passing onlookers, and slinks off down the opposite end of the hallway. Those in his path are quick to move at his expression, and somewhere in between his wordless cursing of Kagura and the Yule Ball, he ends up at his common room door, a circular slab of ash wood set into a finely painted wall of delicate dragons and oceans. 

He stares for a moment at the ornate decorations before glancing down at the watch around his wrist. It's half an hour until dinner, but his interaction with Kagura has left an unusually sour taste in his mouth and his appetite spoiled. Deciding he might as well retire for the day, Sougo lifts a hand and traces some of the ornate shapes carved into the large door, occasionally pushing symbols into the wood. The sequence is accepted and the door clicks, swinging open to reveal the Toppuu common room.

In the warmer season, the wide room is usually splashed blue and green from the glittering ocean outside, an endless jewel lighting up their hollowed space of cliff through a magnificent porthole cut into the stone wall. Around the end of year, however, everything is washed in soothing pale grey, the room's main source of warmth being a large, elegant sunken hearth set into the comfortable tatami mat.

Many of Sougo's fellow housemates loiter casually around it now on squashy cushions, bathed in glowing orange light, and those not sitting by the fire are warmed instead by the kotatsu tables they sit at, their homework spread carelessly along its surface. 

He longs for the latter, thinking fondly of napping underneath the blanket, and spotting an empty table by the porthole, Sougo resolves to claim it as his own after he drops his bag off in his dormitory.

He veers into a polished wooden hallway to the right of the common room, passing by the third year dormitory and into the fourth, sliding open the shoji door. To Sougo's great displeasure, he enters to find that the doors to the balcony have all been thrown open, allowing huge gusts of ocean wind to blow inside from the entirety of the north wall. 

Left with little choice, he goes through the exhausting process of shutting them all, methodically moving his way to the end of the dormitory and towards its only other current inhabitant (and thus most likely culprit), his housemate hanging upside down from a floating broom and reading a book. Without looking up, the other boy tells him, "you look like trash."

Sougo shuts the last balcony door with a bang. "Try again."

His companion hums, thumbing the corner of the next page in his book. "Did you get into a fight with a manticore?"

"Close," Sougo says, throwing his bag onto the floor. "Your sister. Who, by the way, has a date to the Ball."

This finally captures Kamui's full attention. He closes his book with a snap, and though the room is far from big enough for the sound to echo, Sougo is dramatic enough to imagine it does. 

Kamui smiles. "A date," he repeats, and he folds his arms. "To the ball."

Sougo says nothing, resisting the urge to poke the beast. Outside, he can hear the sounds of waves slapping the cliff face below their balcony, and for a long moment, the hiss and pull of the ocean is all that fills the silence. 

After what feels like an eternity, the other boy relaxes his brow. "I see," he says, and he reopens his book.

Sougo stares. "That's it?" he asks. "That's all you have to say? You don't even want to know who he is?"

"Oh," Kamui smiles, not looking up. "I know who he is."

"And you're not going to kill him for touching your precious little sister?"

Kamui shrugs as best he can while hanging upside down. "He's strong," he replies easily. "I like him." 

Sougo frowns, and sensing his disappointment, it occurs to Kamui to ask, "are you jealous?"

The broom neatly zips its owner away before Sougo's foot can entirely connect with Kamui's stomach. His braid swings happily back and forth below his head, and though Sougo is unable to see him from behind his book, he imagines the other boy's expression is one of extreme satisfaction. "Is that a yes?"

"It's a 'shut up,'" Sougo says, and just because he can, he adds spitefully, "I didn't know you could read."

"That's not very nice." 

Kamui angles the book cover so Sougo can properly see it, though it doesn't do him very good with the letters being upside down. He turns his head to the side and slowly reads aloud, "The Art of Magical War, by Sun Tzu."

"I stole it from the library," Kamui provides helpfully.

"You can't steal books from the library, moron. You borrow them for free."

Kamui clicks his tongue. "Details," he says, closing the book and tucking it under his arm. "Anyway—" he rights himself on the broom and hops off, landing neatly on the floor. "It's time for dinner!"

Sougo suddenly remembers his reason behind avoiding the meal altogether and bends to search his futon for his eye mask. "I'll pass. I need a nap."

The other boy tilts his head. "You'll let something like a broken heart dictate your appetite?" 

He easily dodges the pillow Sougo throws at him, grinning. "Pathetic," he says, and adds as he's walking away, "I'll save you some pudding."

"No, you won't!" Sougo calls after him.

"No, I won't!" Kamui agrees, waving his book in goodbye and leaving the room.

Sougo rolls his eyes and straightens with his eye mask held in his hand. He thinks of the Yule Ball and scowls. 

***

In the week that follows, Kamui refuses to tell Sougo the name of Kagura's date.

He'd been unable to resist asking when Kamui came back to the dormitory with ten cups of pudding (all of which his housemate had eaten happily and without remorse), but no amount of prodding nor bribery convinces him to sell out his sister.

"I can't believe _now_ of all times you're deciding to be a good older brother," Sougo tells him one morning at two a.m, when all the other boys in their dormitory have fallen asleep. 

Kamui reaches over from his futon a meter away and flicks Sougo across the forehead. It hurts enough for a dent to have been left in his skull, and while he's cursing from the pain of it, Kamui says, "if you want to know so bad, just ask her."

Sougo would rather cut off a limb and eat it. He tells Kamui exactly so.

The overarching result of this conversation is that it's not until the night of the Yule Ball that Sougo discovers who Kagura has invited.

As always, the Main Hall has been transformed into a gaudy Christmas wonderland, an extravagant imitation of the western party Sougo is sure Headmaster Hata only vaguely remembers from his trip to Europe. The wooden floors have been entirely glossed over in what looks like a sheet of ice, sleek and smooth, but enchanted to be stable enough to walk on. Huge fir trees dressed in layers of white stand guard in every corner of the room and snow drifts lazily from the ceiling in sparkling lights. 

Everything is shiny, and glowing, and tacky to the point where Sougo wants to plunge face first into the punch bowl and never resurface, and as always, Mitsuba adores it.

"Isn't it wonderful?" his sister breathes, spinning carefully on her heel to stare open mouthed at the icicles that hang from the banisters.

"It's... something," Sougo decides, tugging at the collar of his blue robe. It's the nicest comment he has to offer of the entire affair, and for once, he hopes Hijikata will magically appear at his sister's elbow and spirit her away before Sougo accidentally says something stupid. 

Mitsuba, however, catches his tone, and she looks at him, her eyes soft. "Thank you for insisting on staying, Sou-chan," she smiles, taking his hands into her own. "I know you really wanted to go home this year."

Sougo sighs, but he smiles as well. "It's alright, Aneue. Anything for you."

Mitsuba begins to tear up, but before he can warn her against it, she's pulling him into a hug. "You're the best little brother I could ask for," she sniffs. "The _best._ "

"You'll ruin your kimono, Aneue," he reminds her gently, and his sister laughs. 

"As if I mind!" she says, but she pulls away out of consideration for Sougo. "I'm far from winning best dressed."

"You look beautiful," he assures her, and Mitsuba playfully pinches his cheek.

"You save those for your date," she winks, and looks around. "Where is she? You kept your word, didn't you?"

Sougo sighs at the reminder. "She's..." he gestures vaguely behind him, "somewhere. Catching up with her friends."

Mitsuba tilts her head. "But I saw Nobume-chan and Soyo-chan only a minute ago. She wasn't with them."

Sougo frowns. "What do they have to do with my date?"

His sister blinks, taken aback. "But... didn't you ask Kagura-chan to the Ball?"

There is a long moment of silence. Sougo stares.

 _"Why,"_ he begins, eyebrows pulled together in bewilderment, "of all people, would I ever ask _China?"_

His sister pouts. "Well... _you know_ —"

"Mitsuba!"

Startled, the siblings turn in unison to see Hijikata walking towards them, flustered in his hurry. For once, Sougo is so grateful for his appearance that he almost forgives the older boy for the way his expression softens upon his fully realising the sight of Mitsuba in her kimono. Almost.

"Toushirou-san!" Mitsuba beams prettily, and at his arrival, their fingers reach and intertwine in the short space between them. With flushed pink cheeks, Hijikata leans over to whisper something quick into her ear, and Mitsuba giggles into her other hand. 

Sougo is no longer grateful.

"Why are you late, Hijikata-san?" he asks, partly to interrupt their moment, and partly because he can. He'd feel a little bad if Mitsuba didn't also turn her smile in his direction, encouraging Sougo to continue making civil conversation in total unawareness of his true intention. 

Hijikata sours, unbiased and knowing perfectly of Sougo's ultimate goal. Frowning, he replies, "Student Council responsibilities," though from the way he eyes the door, Sougo deduces that at least some of the older boy's distaste is not entirely directed at him. "You didn't see on the way here?"

Sougo shrugs. "We came early."

Mitsuba looks up at him, her brow drawing together in concern. "Was there something wrong?"

Hijikata returns his focus to Sougo's sister and shakes his head, trying for a smile. "No, it was nothing. Just a spat with China girl."

Sougo snaps to attention. "What about her?"

If Hijikata is surprised at his sudden interest, he doesn't show it. "You'll see soon enough," he says, looking again at the door.

Mitsuba squeezes his hand in prompt. "It's not bad, is it?"

Hijikata's frown deepens. "It _will_ be bad. The night hasn't even begun and already her date's taken a massive shit in the Entrance Hall." 

For a long moment, nobody says anything. The siblings stare, open mouthed.

"What?"

Hijikata's expression is humorless at best. "You heard me. It blocked off the main staircase just by sheer size, and for ten minutes, we weren't even allowed to vanish it since Hedoro Sensei came and _insisted_ on taking a fertiliser sample—"

"Why—"

"—so _we_ were tasked with creating a blockade upstairs to stop people from coming down while he did, and would you believe it? Her stupid animal pissed all over the floor too."

"Toushirou-san—"

"But even after all _that,"_ Hijikata continues, quite unable to stop, "China girl _still_ refused to send him away. Sakata even agreed with us and told her it would just make an even bigger mess inside and that he wouldn't allow him in, but then _Hata_ showed up and now he's half in love with the damn thing—"

"Thing?" Sougo interrupts, cutting the older boy off as he pauses to draw breath. "You're not making any sense, Hijikata-san. What does this have to do about China's date?"

Hijikata convulses. "Don't you get it? It _is_ her date—"

"Oh!" Mitsuba suddenly gasps, pointing to the door.

Sougo turns to a chorus of exclamations and cooing, and for a moment, he half-expects trumpets and drums to accompany Kagura's arrival, for considering her usual unladylike disposition, her entrance is (dare he say) almost majestic. 

It goes to show how riding a grand, white dog into a room can do wonders to one's appearance.

From what he remembers learning in Yokai Studies, the creature is an inugami, a dog spirit almost five times Kagura's size, with large bright eyes and paws the size of huge dustbin lids. Seeing his excited trot and eagerly wagging tail, Sougo might have been inclined to call it cute, had he not previously heard about the natural disaster it had caused in the Entrance Hall.

"He's _adorable,"_ Mitsuba breathes, and she moves forward. "I'm going to say hello!"

"Mitsuba!" Hijikata protests, following after her. 

Sougo stays where he is, feeling rather like burning something (someone) to the ground. He scans the room for his target, pointedly looking over Kagura who has paused to let people pet her dog, until he spots who he's looking for stuffing their face at the buffet table. He strides purposefully across the hall, but the head of vermillion hair, so like Kagura's and yet so different, doesn't look up at Sougo's arrival, merely continuing to devour his plate of ongiri. 

After a few seconds of abrasive munching, Sougo runs out of patience. "So," he prompts, talking over the noise. "China's date."

Kamui chooses another ball of rice and eats it whole. "Mm," he says, his mouth full. "Isn't he cute?"

Sougo swats the next ongiri ball out of his hand, and it bounces once on the table before rolling woefully onto the floor. "You _knew,_ " he says accusingly, and Kamui pouts. "You _knew_ it was a dog."

"My rice, Sougo," Kamui whines, his eyes pitifully large. A more naive person might have fallen for it, but years of experience teach Sougo to immediately block right, and he just manages to deflect what would have surely been a crushing jab to his ribs. 

His roommate drops the feigned expression of hurt and grins. "Have some shame," he says, and he shoves Sougo once with his forearm before returning his attention to the buffet.

Sougo scowls. "Fuck you."

"I'd rather not," Kamui returns cheerfully, perusing the wide selection of sushi. Sougo aims a kick to his shin, but the other boy smoothly hops to the side without a second thought. He helps himself to a salmon dish and says, "that baldy father of ours brought him in after a bunch of ippans called in reports of a huge white dog wandering around the outskirts of Tokyo. Not that their pew-lise men—"

" _Police men_ —"

"—could do anything about an inugami."

Sougo exhales through his nose. "So? How did your sister end up parading it around?"

Kamui grins, sharp and smug. "The shitty geezer forgot to get her a Christmas present. He ended up taking the dog home and giving it to her as a pet."

"That's illegal."

"Not when you're Head of Department of Magical Creatures."

Sougo looks to the ceiling. "I hate your family."

Kamui waves a dismissive hand, chewing on two yakitori sticks between his teeth as he balances a second plate. "Go sh-ay hi." 

Sougo scoffs and makes a point by heading off in the opposite direction, hands tucked into the pockets of his robes as he heads for the serenity that is his usual corner, devoid of any and every nuisance present within the hall. Mitsuba will probably scold him for it later, but as he is now, he's not in the mood for anything another than watching on with sullen disapproval.

Truth be told, he's not even sure why he's so annoyed, despite there being of course, a plethora of reasons. He could easily blame his irritation on the tacky decor, the sight of Hijikata sweeping his sister off her feet, maybe even the reminder that his best friend is the biggest shithead on Earth, but he thinks of how China managed to outsmart him and he wants to punch something because that's not how they're supposed to work. He's meant to get under _her_ skin, drive _her_ up a wall, so how did _he_ end up fretting for a week over a dog? How did _he_ end up taking some vapid fifth year to the Ball?

From his corner of the room, he watches people twirl and dance in a flurry of color across the dance floor and scowls. He wishes he had some of his calligraphy brushes on hand to snap in half, and he tilts his head back against the wall.

Somebody nudges his foot. "Oi," says a voice from overhead. "You are bumming everybody out, yes? Stop it."

Sougo opens his eyes despite already knowing who's standing above him. He'd been distracted by the inugami before, but now that she's in front of him, he sees in full vibrancy the red of her kimono. His mouth parts, but almost in the same moment, he remembers himself and schools his face into the usual disinterested expression. "Never knew you were into bestiality, China," he says coolly. "Guess I was wrong. Freaks can get freakier."

Far from the reaction he expects, however, Kagura merely grins. "Don't worry, Sadist — I am sure there's somebody out there who is actually into that stuff and willing to do it with a pig like you, yup."

The response only serves to irritate him further. For three years, Sougo has bid his time learning all her movements, her actions, her responses, taking care in studying and memorising all the many different buttons he can push to elicit the exact kind of reaction he wants from a specific moment, but just when he thought he knew everything about his opponent, he stopped being able to anticipate anything about her. Case in point.

In a voice more bitter than he intends, he asks, "where's your dog?"

She points to the other side of the room where the inugami is happily romping around the buffet table. "His name is Sadaharu," she says, and they watch as he chases after Kamui with bouncing steps, either to eat the boy's plate or his head. Kagura grins. "He is the best, yes."

Sougo doesn't reply, but at the sight of Kamui's mildly threatened expression, the corner of his mouth involuntarily twitches upward. 

Without invitation, Kagura moves to sit next to him, the fabric of her kimono rustling slightly as she slides down the wall. Sougo's fingers twitch when her knee bumps into his, and he forces his hands to lay still over his lap. He supposes it's lucky they're not sitting on actual ice, but with her being so vulnerably open beside him, he's a little bitter about being denied the chance to push the girl and send her flying across the floor. From the way she elbows his arm, he knows she's thinking the same. 

In return to his question, she asks him, "where is _your_ date?"

Sougo considers the question briefly and shrugs. "Probably stealing someone's money."

Kagura snorts. "Did you ask Eromes or something?" 

He hums in confirmation and Kagura's head snaps to look at him, her mouth agape. "Are you serious? I was kidding, yes! Last month she stole Shinpachi's wallet!"

Sougo shrugs again. "Desperate times. The Yosei Joke Shop down at Kabukicho released this new line of kanashibari pillows that charms the user into falling into some kind of sleep paralysis. I was going to slip Hijikata-san one, but I need at least four gold pieces to buy it."

Kagura makes a disgusted noise. "You are _working_ with her?"

"Don't be stupid, China. I'm obviously going to steal whatever money she makes tonight and dump her."

Kagura's mouth falls open and she stares, once again stunned. Finally, her expression begins to slowly lighten. "Sadist," she says, "that's actually pretty cool."

Sougo almost smiles but he stops himself. 'Who are you?' he wants to ask. 'What have you done with the real China?'

What comes out instead, however, is, "why are you here?" 

The spell breaks.

Kagura puffs out her cheeks and works a pinkie into her nose, ever the picture of dignity. "Mitsu-nee. She told me to go and bother you for a few minutes so you would not be sitting here pathetic and alone." She pauses to flick a booger to the side. "I see why you have trouble saying no to her, yes."

Sougo rolls his eyes. What his sister hopes to achieve is beyond him, but he's had enough of Mitsuba's insinuations for one night. "Feel free to leave," he tells her flatly. "Some people actually like being alone, China." 

Kagura moves on to her other nostril. "Is that why you have not been annoying me this week?"

Sougo blinks, turning to look at her. "Haven't I?"

He hadn't really noticed. Probably, he had been subconsciously avoiding her in an effort to prevent himself from asking as to the identity of her date (though now of course, he realises it had been both a weak and not to mention pointless exercise). He'd hated not knowing what to expect, and even now, the thought sets him on edge, but he takes her in, so casually picking her nose in an outfit fancier than he'd ever thought he'd see her in, and he thinks that for all her surprises, the jarring sight is so very Kagura.

Sensing his stare, she turns to him and grins. "Not that it was bad for me, yes," she says, and she wipes her finger on his sleeve.

"Oi—"

"It was very peaceful. Almost like you were dead, yup." 

While Sougo shakes out the arm of his robe, she gets to her feet, brushing out the creases in the bright layered silk of her dress. "I'm going to have some fun now," she says, and she grins down at him, a flawless picture of Christmas. "You can make do on my word and die, yes." 

Sougo looks up in time to see her walk away, the cherry blossom pin holding up her hair catching prettily in the light. It's new, maybe borrowed from a friend or perhaps something she bought. He doesn't know for sure, but it occurs to him then that despite knowing how she eats, how she breathes, how she _lives_ — 

He doesn't know all that much about her.

He gets it now, he thinks, why he can't expect to predict her every move. From the beginning, he really had only half the facts, half of the reality that makes her up entirely. But for the first time that night, he can't think of a single reason to be mad; for she is who she is and he is who he is, and in that moment, it's enough. He'll let himself be surprised for as long as it takes, because one day, he swears he will have carnal knowledge of her, but until then, he'll spend his entire life getting to know her.

"China," he calls after her, and she stops, looking back. "Dance with me."

She wrinkles her nose. "Why?"

He spots Mitsuba across the hall and resists the urge to sigh. "For one," he says, pretending to not see as she waves at him merrily, "it would get my sister off my back. And two," he pauses, meeting Kagura's eye seriously, "I'll give you twenty percent of whatever money I make off Eromes tonight."

For an entire minute, Kagura is silent. Then — 

"Seventy percent."

Sougo stares. "Are you crazy? Thirty percent."

"Seventy percent."

"Oi, you're supposed to be going lower than your original price."

"Seventy percent."

He scowls. " _Fifty_ percent. Anything beyond that and the deal is off."

Kagura considers this. "Okay," she says finally, and holds out a hand. "Fifty percent. Half and half. Partners, yes?"

He'll barely have enough for the prank pillow, but he'll make do. He rolls his eyes and accepts her help. In his much larger, calloused palm, Kagura's hand is dainty and childlike, but strong. She easily hauls him to his feet, and without letting go, Sougo drags her to the empty space cleared out in the middle of the hall for dancing.

"And—" Kagura adds, squeezing his hand (it quickly becomes a contest to see who can break the other's fingers first), "I want food, yes? Next Kabukicho trip, I want some of that rainbow mochi from downtown."

Sougo stops and turns on his heel. Tugging Kagura's arm towards him, he catches her by the waist and pulls her close so that she is pressed flush against his chest. "Don't push your luck, China," he grins, and she punches his shoulder with a scowl.

For the rest of the dance, they try and step on each other's toes as much as possible, and in their next dance, and the dance after that, and Sougo thinks that in another universe, he might enjoy a white Christmas, but for once in this life, it might not be so bad.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hoo boy, this was long.
> 
> Sorry for the wait! This was the most backbreaking chapter by far, because proper characterization? Never heard of her lmao.
> 
> In case you were wondering, an 'ippan' is the Japanese Wizard equivalent to muggle. It just means ordinary in Japanese, and I thought it was a term fitting for those without magic. If you haven't read Harry Potter, there is a difference between a muggle and a squib (here, an ippan and a munousha). 
> 
> A muggle (ippan) is somebody who is born to two non-magical parents and is incapable of performing magic, whereas a squib (munousha) is a human who is born with at least one magical parent, but does not inherit any magic power at all. The meaning of the term munousha derives from the word 'incompetent,' which is how wizards normally view squibs. I thought it'd be interesting to make Ikumatsu a squib in my story as she's more of a pacifist in canon, and plus it gave me a chance to explore this side of Japanese wizardry. Sorry for not explaining it in the last chapter!
> 
> Also, before you mention it, I'm aware that the Yule Ball is only held in the event of a Triwizard Tournament, but I like to think Hata takes any excuse he can to throw parties by absorbing traditions from other countries, which is why at my version of Mahoutokoro, the Yule Ball is held yearly.
> 
> I think that's all I wanted to say about this chapter. I hope you liked the sibling appearances! The time jumps between each update are still happening as this is a collection of random oneshots, and they'll appear more often from now on so stay tuned! If you have any questions or ideas about future chapters/characters you would like to see, either comment below or message me at my tumblr at arasei.tumblr.com where I also occasionally post Gintama art. I'm excited to hear from you guys!
> 
> Love you, and thanks for reading <3
> 
> \- Arasei


	4. Kamui - 7th Year

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you've read JKR's summary of Mahoutokoro, you'd probably know that the school's day students ride giant storm petrels to school and back on a daily basis but ;;; that's so stupid. I mean, okay, they're magic birds, but Minami Iwo Jima is about five hours from Japan, so you're telling me these kids spend ten hours a day just for travel??? Yeah, no. 
> 
> For this AU, I decided to change it up — day students make use of their local torii gates to travel between home and school, and the giant petrels are flown only on special occasions. For example, by first years on their first day of school ;)

In hindsight, Kamui has only himself to blame.

He remembers the beginning of his second year with perfect clarity, recalls a setting sky painted in the colors of orange, pink and purple and the elegance of its reflection across the rippling waters of Crescent Bay. In the distance behind them, Mahoutokoro Palace was a stunning beauty made of white jade and rose-colored roofs — there was no greater backdrop nor weather more fitting for a grand entrance. 

His little sister was in for a treat.

“She’s as annoying as you, probably,” Sougo had said, bored and unbothered. Like the rest of the student body, they were gathered along the edge of the bay with their faces turned up towards the clouds, waiting with casual anticipation for the first glimpse of wings to cut across the sky. 

As per usual ceremony, that year’s first grade would be arriving on the backs of giant storm petrels, travelling from the mainland of Japan to Minami Iwo-Jima. The birds would set across the surface of the bay, bringing the first years to shore where they would then be greeted by their senior upperclassmen and led up in a procession towards the school.

The year before, Kamui had been the one flying on the backs of those birds. That year, he was one among the many welcoming the new students.

“Probably,” he had said with a grin.

The Kamui from back then was not aware of the event to come five years later. 

“Oi.” 

The Kamui from ten minutes later after that moment would also be ignorant to the spark of interest in Sougo’s eye upon Kagura shooting them a grin as her petrel came to a glide across the water. 

“Hey, brat.” 

And the Kamui in the years leading up to the one he is today, the Kamui that had been half-cheering them on with a kind of enthusiasm born only from lack of any other stronger suitors worthy of his sister—

“Are you listening?” 

He dies today.

_“Kamui!”_

The room snaps into focus. 

He blinks, taking in the small office made smaller still by the square bookshelves that line all four walls from floor to ceiling. Strange planetary globes and whirring silver instruments decorate the boxed spaces in place of where one ordinarily would’ve stocked rolls of parchment or scrolls, a collection that has since expanded according to his last visit. 

Behind the large square desk Kamui is seated at, he notices a new and rather fanciful armillary sphere he doesn’t remember seeing before. The shiny, spinning handles are quick to direct his gaze over towards the woman standing just beside it, and accidentally, he looks up to meet the formidable eye of Mahoutokoro’s Deputy Headmistress. 

“Focus, boy,” she tells him sharply, the edge of her words stilted around the end of her rolled-up cigarette. “You’re in enough trouble as it is.”

Having regained his bearings, Kamui puts on a smile, his entire demeanour lazy and indifferent. “I don’t see why. Shinsuke used to set fires all the time.”

Otose spits out a voluminous cloud of acrid smoke, heightening her uncanny resemblance to an ill-tempered dragon. “And is that what this is? A continuation of his great legacy?”

“Ahaha!” cuts in an obnoxious laugh. “Don’t be silly, Otose!”

The older woman's expression sours at the interruption, but Sakamoto Sensei takes no notice. “Their methods are completely different! Don’t you remember? Takasugi-kun used the ardeo charm to set his fires, while today, Kamui-kun practiced the incendium variation! His execution of the spell was very well done, actually—“ he stops quite suddenly, taking in Otose's explosive expression. “Ahaha! Why, Otose! Don’t you look scary!”

Her eye twitches, and sparks flare hotly from the end of her cigarette. “Try again, you shitty head of house."

Sakamoto laughs again, loud and unrepentant. “We are teachers, aren’t we? Shouldn’t we congratulate their successes in skills learnt from class?”

Otose smacks the back of his head. "Not when they almost burn down a common room beyond magical repair, you moron!” 

Sakamoto recoils but shoots Kamui an obvious wink from across the table and Otose throws up her hands and rounds on the latter instead. “And _you!_ Not even Takasugi would set fire to his own dormitory! What the hell were you thinking?! _Why_ were you thinking it, you damn brat!”

Kamui hums in answer, his attention beginning to drift once again. “It’s a long story.”

“Ahaha! It must be if it involves your duel with Okita-kun in the Entrance Hall!”

The change in Kamui's attitude is imperceptible, save for the certain preciseness to his next words. “Sensei," he says, "I’d appreciate if you didn’t say that name in front of me.”

Otose, ever the eagle-eyed observer, is quick to catch his tone. “Now we’re getting somewhere,” she says, satisfied. “I suppose he had something to do with the fire.”

He tilts his head. “Something like that.”

The warning in his smile is clear, but his teachers have known him since he was eleven — they remain undeterred. Otose crosses her arms and Sakamoto leans back into his chair.

“No need to worry, Kamui-kun,” Sakamoto grins. “Long story or not, we're not going anywhere.”

***

It starts small.

To the untrained eye, it would've been just another of their usual fights, a savage battle of vicious hair pulling, obscene shouting, and shin-kicking as they walk, Sougo leading and Kagura overpowering. But in the space between them, barely visible amidst the long, trailing sleeves of their robes, sometimes, his thumb will brush over her knuckles, and her fingers will tangle with his. To those who know them far less, it would have gone by unnoticed, but Kamui is among the first to see how occasionally, they would look down at their hands with warm, private smiles.

It was sweet.

The end of sixth year brings with it a new development.

Kamui had been searching for Sougo in the library (looking to try out a new spell at Sakata’s recommendation) when he’d discovered the other boy and his little sister studying together at a back table. The concept was not so jarring that Kamui was thrown, as the previous year had often found Sougo tutoring Kagura in a variety of subjects (he’d apparently dared her to finish off the year with stellar grades, and yet, had been somehow roped into helping her achieve said goal) — but last year, Kagura had not been sitting in Sougo’s lap. 

She was considerably red in the face, struggling to write in perfect lettering a note of reference on the parchment before her while Sougo watched curiously over her shoulder, his arms circled around her waist and chin tucked casually in the crook of her neck.

Kamui was not so genial that he let his roommate off without a good jinx to the face, but it was so simple a scene, so content, that it had been done (mostly) without malicious intent.

But that was then. And back then, they hadn’t been doing anything that warranted a dormitory on fire.

This was now.

“What are you doing, Sougo?”

The boy in question half yawns in response, tucking an arm behind his head. “What does it look like I’m doing?” 

Kamui watches him doze lazily underneath layers of blankets. “It looks," he begins, pausing to allow for the sheer depravity of his next words to sink in, "like you’re lying naked in my futon.”

The distinctly human shaped lump hiding beside Sougo jerks below the blanket. 

Sougo considers this information. After a long, awkward moment of silence, he says, “to be fair — we didn’t know it was your futon when we ended up in here.”

The lump makes a mortified sound.

Kamui throws his bag to the side.

“Dearly beloved,” he says, clapping his hands together. “We are gathered here today in order to honor the _death_ of one Okita Sougo—“

“Kamui!” a female voice protests, then gasps, as if shocked by her own audacity.

“—by dismemberment—“

“Hey.“

"—Mauling—"

" _Oi."_ "

“—falling piano—"

"God."

" _—painfully_ severe mauling—“

“You've said mauling already.”

“—and finally,” Kamui talks over him, spreading his hands with dangerous flourish. “Castration.”

A head of vermillion hair surfaces from beneath the blanket.

 _“Kamui,”_ Kagura says again, but this time, his name is said with the finality of somebody who knows when the jig is up. “Enough!”

A thick layer of tension descends over the room. Kamui is still somewhat smiling. “You fucked my little sister,” he says, meeting Sougo's gaze. “In my own futon.”

Silence reigns. Neither he nor his roommate so much as shift, their eyes locked in hard, calculating battle. Kagura tenses, ready to intervene should her brother make any untoward movement. Outside, a seagull crows.

Sougo moves first.

In one smooth motion, he snags the blanket around his waist, and in the direction of the door, disappears in an instant. 

Kagura gapes, staring at the space he only just vacated a moment before. "Hey!" she thinks to yell out after him. "Where do you think you are going?!"

Kamui sighs, relaxing his shoulders and composedly rolling up his sleeves. "Kagura. You might want to move."

She turns around, ready to fire back a retort before she realises he's pulled out his wand and pointed it purposely to the bedding underneath her. "Oi!" she shouts in panic, almost tripping over the blankets wrapped around herself in her frantic rush to get away. "Kamui, don't—"

_BOOM!_

His futon bursts into flames.

"KAMUI!" his sister shrieks, reeling back from the power of the explosion. "YOU _IDIOT!"_

He turns away from the growing fire and leaves Kagura rushing about to find her wand. " _Sou-_ go," Kamui sings, walking leisurely towards the door. "Come back!" 

Kagura shouts something obscene after his retreating form and his expression darkens. "I haven't finished your funeral rites yet."

***

Roars of laughter fill Sakamoto's office.

"In — your _own — futon!"_ Sakamoto howls, bent over the table and slamming a fist into its surface. Otose cackles beside him, almost bent double with the effort of standing as she chokingly gasps for air.

Kamui smiles, an action betraying murderous intent rather than amusement. "Would you like me to fetch my sister? She and her..." his face twitches, " _friend,_ are waiting outside."

Otose waves a hand, still struggling to regain breath. "You — can go," she wheezes. "Just this once — your own futon — on fire — fair."

He pushes back his chair and stands, already on his way. "I'll be taking my leave."

Sakamoto almost rolls out of his seat. "I can't wait — to tell Kintoki," he manages to say in-between gulps of air. "It'll be hilarious!"

The shrieks of laughter escalate in volume and Kamui shuts the door behind him, cutting off the noise. 

True to his word, Kagura and Sougo are waiting outside, fully dressed and sitting against the wall opposite Sakamoto's office. He's quick to note the distance between them, far too great to be accidental and orchestrated most likely at Kagura's insistence, if the prominent red of her cheek is any indication. 

Sougo, meanwhile, bears no hint of shame. He catches Kamui's eye and grins. "Hey," he says, careless and wicked all at once. " _Onii-san._ "

The obnoxious sound of Sakamoto's laughter floats out from underneath the door.

_It'll be hilarious!_

Kamui has a sudden vision of the time Sakata once flipped his shit upon catching the couple holding hands.

Yes, Kamui thinks, it would be.

He smiles with the sharp of his teeth. "The hag says you're free to go," he tells them, walking away. Over his shoulder, he calls back, "don't let me catch you again."

He hears Sougo mutter, "what happened to him?" and tucking his hands into his pockets, Kamui whistles happily all the way down the corridor. 

Not only would Sakata's expression be monumentally gratifying upon hearing of the incident, but Sougo's imminent suffering at their teacher's hand is not just a guarantee; it's a promise. His punishment will probably not be as pleasant as castration, but maybe, the side effects would be just as satisfying.

His futon is in ashes now, but Kamui can arrange for a new one later.

He cheers up considerably.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> SPECIAL THANKS TO MY GIRL MEL FOR THE BEST LINES IN THIS CHAPTER!!!
> 
> Honest to God, you are my savior <3 For the life of me I could not picture Kamui's reaction because a) he's such a difficult character to write, and b) I don't even know what _I_ would do if I ever found my younger sibling having sex in my own bed??? What.
> 
> Anyway, this was such a duMB chapter and so slow moving, but I love the Kamui and Sougo brotp and also Kamui being simultaneously the best and worst brother™
> 
> I recently did a drawing of what I imagine the Mahoutokoro uniform would be like featuring okikagu, so if you're interested in seeing that you can check it out in my doodle tag at arasei.tumblr.com. If you wanna yell at me about this chapter you can do so here in the comments or there in my tumblr message box :')
> 
> Til the next chapter!


	5. Yamazaki - 6th Year

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To my favorite person ever :D
> 
> Hope this brightens your day, Mel! Even if only by just a lil bit. It's the least I can do <3

Mahoutokoro, perfection though it may be, is a metaphorical fish tank.

In a world of magic built on rumor, privacy is but a mere pipe dream – ideal, but impossible. The very walls of the school itself, alive with drawings of myth and legend, are complicit in the producing and spreading of gossip by their telling to anybody interested. Many a scandal in the past, in fact, had been discovered through the nosy curiosity of Mizuchi, the painted dragon of Mahoutokoro’s East Building whose favourite pastime was to listen in into students’ conversations before travelling between floors in order to share word.

As bare-faced and transparent as the next student, a secret passed along in their fish tank of a school cannot be expected to stay secret at all. Which, in hindsight, is one reason as to why one winter afternoon finds Yamazaki sat outside the door of Murata’s Wands.

He sighs, adjusting the wool of his scarf to better cover his mouth. For almost an hour he’s been waiting for his quarry to leave the comfortable heat of their chosen ramen stall, watching with bated breath for _something_ to happen, only for nothing occur.

“You’re doing this for love,” Yamazaki mutters, rubbing the palms of his hands together for warmth. _“Love,_ Zaki.” 

There is little to no point in him stalking his teachers otherwise. 

As if in prompt, the flaps of the store suddenly lift and its remaining two customers stumble out from underneath, bracing themselves against a flurry of afternoon snow. 

Yamazaki perks, though shrinks back into the archway of the store behind him so as to not draw attention. The man and woman from the stall are quick to pull their coats tight over their shoulders, and after a moment of conversation (unable to be heard over the wind), they begin the walk up Kabukicho Main Street.

He gives them a minute headstart before hurrying to follow, the orange of his robes flapping about his ankles from where they peek out underneath the purposeful disguise of his grey cloak. With the color artfully blending into the snowy backdrop behind him, Yamazaki is rendered almost invisible – a precaution only he, the official investigator of Mahoutokoro’s Student Council, would be meticulous enough to take.

In such bitter weather, there are no crowds to hinder Yamazaki’s investigation, but with each step, the snowfall that had so plagued him earlier gradually begins to lessen, and soon, he's wishing for the anonymity of a faceless mass to blend in with. “Why'd you have to stop now?” he despairs, looking up at the clearing sky. Some distance away, his target seems to glance over his shoulder, and catching the movement, Yamazaki yelps and darts into the space of the nearest alleyway. He clutches his chest, breathing hard in his panic. If the older man had seen him, it would be over for Yamazaki – both in peace of mind and love.

He spends a long and torturous minute tucked into the side of the closest building to him, the plaster cold through the arm of his cloak. Waiting for impending doom, he braces himself with each second that passes - but despite his worry, nobody comes to check the alley; and confused, he summons enough courage to peek around the corner. Still walking, Sakata Sensei is tugging at his companion’s scarf, a lazy grin lifting the corners of his mouth. There is no sign of him having seen even a glimpse of Yamazaki's scarf, and the boy heaves a sigh of relief, finally peeling away from the alley to continue following them at a safer distance. 

With the initial feeling of panic having faded, Yamazaki cheers up, allowing himself a moment of excitement. Even from so far away, the affectionate look in Sakata’s gaze as he speaks is clear, and as Yamazaki watches Tsukuyo Sensei elbow his chest, her cheeks flushed pink, he positively jitters.

They _have_ to be dating, he tells himself. They have to be dating, and he, Yamazaki Sagaru, will have been the first to discover the truth behind one of the Seven Mysteries of Mahoutokoro.

He can't wait to let Tama know.

_“I want nothing for Christmas,”_ the love of his life had told him. _“I have no need for a material gift.”_

That was true enough. What could a beautiful, half-yokai, top-scoring student ever want for? 

And it occurred to him. _Data._

Tama loved knowing things, from the best way to brew a Confusing Concoction, to how Otose Sensei liked her tea. For a girl driven by knowledge, not possession, wouldn’t the perfect gift be a truth nobody had yet to uncover? 

For enigmatic in truth, and dubious in credibility, the Seven Mysteries were famous for being the only rumors left in school unconfirmed. It was the greatest dream of many to see one solved and the highest ambition of the worst gossip lover to be the grand mastermind behind its conclusion, and though Yamazaki falls into neither category, for Tama, he is determined to fulfill the ambition of the latter.

And he wouldn't be solving just any mystery – it would be that of Mahoutokoro’s longest running secret; the _real_ nature behind Sakata and Tsukuyo Sensei’s personal relationship.

He sighs lovingly, capturing the puff of breath into his cupped hands. The tips of his fingers are turning blue over his chosen aesthetic of fingerless gloves to the practicality of mittens, but he barely notices. Tama would surely love his gift – and to be rewarded even one of her smiles would make losing a finger or two completely worth it. 

His teachers proceed up the path leading into the forest residing over the village, and snapping out of it, Yamazaki hurries after them, almost tripping over newly made dunes of powdery snow. He follows the two pairs of fresh footprints made by the couple all the way up to Kabukicho’s torii gate, the local shrine situated some ways behind the red pillars. He's watching Sakata and Tsukuyo Sensei disappear between them when he frowns, a thought having just occurred to him. Beyond the torii, there is no cover for him to hide behind – only open land between the gate and the palace. It would take a great deal of acting in order to continue trailing his teachers all the way up to the school without drawing suspicion, but just as quickly as this realisation comes, it dawns on him also that he has no other choice.

When the coast is clear, Yamazaki edges around the tree he's hiding behind, walking slowly so as to rejoin the forest path as normally as possible. Thankfully, Gedoumaru Sensei is the teacher on duty by the gate, and as expected from her reserved personality, she is apathetic to Yamazaki’s awkwardness.

“Going back already?” she asks, emotionless. Privately, Yamazaki marvels over how she can still make the query sound like a question with little to no inflection in her voice.

“A-ah, yes,” he replies, half-laughing and half praying. Impartial though Gedoumaru Sensei may be, it is impossible to miss the almost pointed shine of her club. “There wasn’t much to do today.”

The weapon in her hand twitches, and Yamazaki flinches back with a squeak; but the Yokai-Studies teacher merely points the end toward the gate.

“T-thanks, Sensei,” he bleats, petrified. Edging around the club, he breaks into a brisk walk and almost dives between the pillars. The sensation of walking through thick syrup lasts a mere second before he emerges through the other side, unscathed but almost keeling over from gulping heavy breaths of relief. 

"I survived," he wheezes, as if speaking the words into existence will calm his overexcited heart. It mostly works, and he eventually straightens, shaking out his limbs as he does so. There was a reason behind his not choosing Yokai Studies as an elective and that reason was five feet of fortified metal.

In the distance, he can see the white and black blur that is Sakata and Tsukuyo Sensei respectively, walking the long bridge across the lake toward the mountain. Above them, he can see the beginnings of a tall, winding staircase cut into the grass hills, of which they all must ascend to reach Mahoutokoro Palace situated at the top. He groans inwardly, thinking of the tiring climb, and sets out to follow them at what he hopes is a leisurely speed. He makes it past the crossing and to the first step of the mountain staircase, when-

"Yamazaki-senpai!"

He trips at the sound, almost falling face first into the fourth step. He looks up in panic, but the teachers are already too far up the staircase to hear, and he silently thanks whatever god responsible. 

The owner of the voice catches up to him. "Ah, sorry about that, Senpai!" Shinpachi laughs, helping him up. "I didn't mean to startle you."

Yamazaki accepts his help with a relieved smile. "No, it was my fault. I should have been paying more attention."

They climb the stairs together. "Are you just coming back from Kabukicho?"

Shinpachi winces. "Actually, I've been waiting by the bay since noon. My glasses, you see-" he pulls out an identical pair of spectacles to the one he's wearing from his pocket - "they've been possessed by a tsukumogami." 

The glasses in his palm twitch and shriek of their own accord, clear evidence as to the Yokai spirit inhabiting its form. Yamazaki's expression sobers in sympathy. "I had the same problem last week with my Potions textbook," he says, shaking his head. "I think there's been an infestation."

The younger boy shrugs, tucking the spectacles back into his robe. "I could live with it, if I had to. The problem is, every time I wear them now, they show me weird spirits hanging onto people's backs." He shudders, looking sick. "It's really creepy. I was waiting for Sakata Sensei so I could ask him for help-"

Yamazaki squawks and tackles him into a bush. Shinpachi lets out a shriek before he's appropriately silenced by Yamazaki slamming a hand over his mouth. The latter rapidly gestures for Shinpachi to keep quiet before he pops his head out of the bush to check on the progress of the two adults further up the stairs. Once again, they don't take any notice.

He sighs, rolling off the other boy. "Sorry, Shinpachi-kun," he cringes. "But I can't risk you interfering."

Shinpachi stares, wide-eyed. "With _what?_ And-" he struggles for a moment, attempting to free the arm of his robe from a bramble. "Why are we in a _bush?"_

Yamazaki smiles apologetically. "Secret mission," he says, by way of explanation. He stands up, brushing the leaves from his clothes. "I'll be tailing Sensei for a bit, so I'm afraid you'll have to find him later!" He waves, stumbling out of the bush and onto the stairs. "Just a few hours will do!" 

"Wait!" he hears Shinpachi call out after him. "What - _Yamazaki-Senpai!"_

Yamazaki hurries on. To his relief, they make it up the staircase without further interruption, and he assumes Shinpachi must have given up. But in the confines of the palace, a more pressing problem arises. 

He'd thought that following his teachers across open plain would prove a greater struggle than it would indoors, but Yamazaki had neglected to consider Mahoutokoro's narrow corridors, intersecting rooms, and hidden passageways. It would be much harder to pass off his stalking of the couple as mere coincidence in such a complicated battleground, and this proves true a few minutes into their adventure when his teachers disappear behind the giant paper tapestry of Orochi, the Eight-Headed Serpent.

Yamazaki frowns, thinking. The passageway that lies behind it is a long one, and dim from lack of lanterns. To light his wand in such a space would surely give away his position, and he'd be heard if he went about stumbling in the dark after them. The only alternative he has left would be to take a chance and hopefully beat his teachers to the exit, at which point he can continue tailing them from there.

He makes his decision and runs back the way he came through the door of the North Building, almost knocking over a passing student in his haste. The girl shouts something after him, but beyond a quick yelled back apology, Yamazaki pays no heed, flying down the main flight of stairs he had just previously climbed. This time, he turns left at the first exit he sees, following the stone path leading around the mountain to Mahoutokoro's East Wing, where he is sure Sakata and Tsukuyo Sensei will be emerging from instead of the usual outlet that is the bamboo painting opposite the girl's bathroom in the West Building. 

He can't help but think it clever of his teachers to use the Orochi passageway, for not only do people little know of its existence, it has the additional deceptive benefit of leading to a different building on Saturdays. At three o'clock, Mizuchi is also sure to have evacuated his usual dive in the East in favor of more gossip-infested waters, which suggests to Yamazaki that Sakata and Tsukuyo's time of return was an additional preemptive measure rather than one borne out of spontaneity. If these are the kind of tactics they've been employing, it's no wonder they've yet to be discovered.

But Yamazaki is not investigator of the Student Council for nothing. 

More privy to the inner workings of Mahoutokoro than most, he knows the school almost as well as its teachers. Many an afternoon he's spent exploring the narrow halls and out of use classrooms so as to better live up to his role in the Council, and it is this intimate knowledge of shortcuts and passageways that secures his confidence as he races to the mirror hung beside the door of the East Wing's ceremonial tea preparation room.

"I should really put this down onto a map," he pants, but he's quick to put the thought aside as he crashes through the pretty garden connecting the North and East buildings, disrupting a gaggle of gold-feathered birds loitering by the bank of the pond below History Bridge and earning their indignant screams in the process. 

By the time Yamazaki reaches the East building's official courtyard entrance, six minutes have passed and panic has begun to settle in his stomach as his window of opportunity steadily closes.

He barges up the long porch and through the door with such impropriety, that at any moment Yamazaki expects to be seized by the ear and dragged away. Hinowa Sensei is the kindest person he knows, but as Head of the Arts and Music department, it's to be expected that she enforce a level of cultured politeness and respect from students when within the boundaries of the East Wing, none of which Yamazaki exercises on his way to the second floor and knows he will be paying for later, if the dirty looks people shoot him as he runs is anything to go by. "Sorry!" he yells as he goes by, though it probably doesn't help.

His reckless speed, however, is his saving grace, and having not accidentally met Sakata and Tsukuyo on the stairs, he assumes he made it before them. The East Wing is relatively smaller than the other buildings that make up Mahoutokoro palace, made up of only two floors and one staircase, and in this way, his teachers are trapped. Yamazaki comes to sit at the top step, breathless but grinning. He would definitely solve this mystery for Tama before dinner.

He can picture it, the image of wonder lighting up her deep eyes and the corners of her mouth lifting in delighted surprise. Yamazaki almost melts into the floor at the thought.

Minutes later, however, his teachers have still not shown up.

"I didn't even have to run," Yamazaki grumbles, but his real annoyance is directed elsewhere. Possibly, there was a very small, minuscule, insignificant chance - his prediction had been wrong.

"But there's only one way out through that tunnel," he says to himself. "And only one way out this building. So-"

Suddenly, there's a loud crash from further down the hall.

Yamazaki jumps and slips off the top step with an undignified yelp, accidentally slamming his right ankle against the wood of the stairs further down. He winces, massaging the oncoming bruise, and looks around - but after the initial sound, he hears nothing. Nonetheless, he gets up and awkwardly hobbles down the hall to investigate.

He peers into rooms stocked full with art supplies and dusty instruments, but devoid of humans. It's no surprise, considering the first floor is more dedicated to class use and the second mostly to storage. "Probably just another tsukumogami," Yamazaki muttes, when a thought arises. 

He stops. "No way," he says in awe, heart thrumming excitedly. _"No way."_

There was very little chance for the adults to have arrived before him, but on the off chance they _had,_ Yamazaki realises they could have easily disappeared into another passageway after shortly arriving (unlikely, as the remaining three he knows of located within the East Building are all unavailable in the afternoon), or -

they could have moved into the comfortable quarters of Tsukuyo's office - also located along the hall of the second floor.

Yamazaki creeps toward it now, his earlier excitement swelling the closer he draws to the maple-leaf print of the shoji door. Now only three feet away, he hears another sound, this time of paper rustling against the floor, perhaps from having just been pushed off a surface.

"Gintoki," he hears a female voice whisper, and Yamazaki fights back a grin. 

_Tama-san,_ he thinks, ever-so-gently sliding the door open by an inch. _This is for you!_

He peers into the room. And-

Oh.

_Oh._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You ever catch your parents getting down and dirty? Poor Zaki :')
> 
> It's probably really obvious that this chapter was just another shameless excuse for worldbuilding, but it sets up the next chapter told from Kagura's POV nicely, so I have a reason? Mostly D:
> 
> Although this whole fic has just been random time jumps one after the other, the next chapter takes place a direct week after this one so we now have at least some linear continuity! It goes more into depth about the Seven Mysteries of Mahoutokoro, which I have been so excited to share with you guys since my girl Mel and I first came up with them! In true Gintama fashion, they're just weird rumors about the teachers, but they're real funny and I hope you come to like the gossip infested drama of this universe!
> 
> Uni has just started up again, so the chapter won't be up for a while, but there will be more Sakamoto and general Yorozuya shenanigans (I can't believe there have been none since I started writing this fic?!), so please look forward to that! Just some notes about this chapter though - if you were curious, 'yokai' is an umbrella term for Japanese spirits, like how a tsukumogami (a tool that has acquired a spirit) is a type of yokai. The Care of Magical Creatures subject is taught as Yokai Studies at Mahoutokoro by Gedoumaru, who is a type of yokai herself! It gets a little confusing so if you need any clarification let me know :D 
> 
> Thanks to all the people who commented last chapter and to those who went out of their way to message me on my tumblr! You guys are so sweet and are really what keep these dumb drabbles going! I've never been more proud to be a Gintama fan and I love you all so much! Hope to talk to you again soon <3
> 
> Til next time!
> 
> \- Arasei


	6. Kagura - 2nd Year

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In honor of the last chapter of Gintama, I managed to pull myself together and now present to you, the long-awaited update of Magic and Other Misdemeanors.
> 
> (a continuation of chapter 5)

Fold the outer edge.

“And he suddenly just pushed me! Right into a bush!”

Fold the right wing over to the left.

“He didn’t even explain _why-"_

Turn over and repeat.

"He just took off and said to look for Gin-san later and... you’re not even listening to me are you?” 

Fold the top wing up-

_"Kagura-chan!"_

Kagura doesn't look up. "Hm?" she asks, turning over the misshapen paper crane in her hand. Did Kamui say to fold the wing left or right? “You say something, Pachi?"

Maybe left.

" _Yes,_ actually," Shinpachi snaps, but he's familiar enough with her usual lack of attention that he does nothing more than huff and cross his arms. "But forget it. I see you're intent on ignoring me."

No, definitely to the right. “Uh-huh,” Kagura responds, pinching tight her last bit of paper - she doesn't see the way Shinpachi's eye twitches. Satisfied, she holds her crane up into the air and beams. “I did it!” 

In the light, the bird's asymmetry is even more pronounced; the wings are of an uneven length, and the beak is questionable at best, but all the same she’s rather proud of it. 

Shinpachi makes an inquiry as to what it’s for, but Kagura pays no heed, grabbing her wand and smartly tapping it against its paper body. “Fēibu!” she orders, and the crane weakly shakes its wings out, flapping gently against the table. With great effort, it manages to take flight, and they watch as it struggles across the room, drunkenly tipping from side to side. 

“I don’t think you did that one right,” Shinpachi says, unimpressed, but Kagura hushes him as the crane reaches its destination, coming to a shaky land on top of a head of shiny black hair sitting two rows from the front of the room. The girl underneath it jerks in surprise at contact, and the bird wobbles precariously in place until she catches it in one hand. Looking once around the room, she hunches over to inconspicuously unfold the bird in her lap. 

Quickly, Soyo reads the message scrawled onto the paper, her mouth moving silently along with the words before she grins. She looks back at Kagura and gives her a thumbs up.

Shinpachi raises an eyebrow. “What’s that about?”

Kagura waves back and Soyo giggles into her hand, returning to face the front of the classroom before Otose Sensei can notice. “Nothing,” Kagura tells him primly, and changes the subject. “You are supposed to be grinding Kappa nails, yes?”

Shinpachi’s expression sours. _“I_ was in charge of cutting up leeches,” he corrects, unimpressed, and emphasizes with great disdain, “It was disgusting.”

Kagura leans over to look at his side of the work bench and sees great jiggly bits of leech gathered up in a pile on the chopping board, ready to be added into their simmering cauldron. “That’s cool,” she observes.

“It was not,” Shinpachi grumbles. He adds pointedly, “You were in charge of the nails. I’ve done my bit, and I’m not strong enough to grind them nearly as well as you do.”

She meets his reproachful gaze with a glare, mutinously reaching over to grab their set of mortar and pestle. “I _hate_ Potions.”

The old lady is her second favorite teacher, but even Otose Sensei can’t make a boring class suddenly interesting. It’s tedious work, stirring liquid in a pot clockwise, twice anti-clockwise, adding an ingredient precisely seventeen seconds after another ingredient and not before – Kagura has always lacked both the attention span and enthusiasm needed to excel in the subject, and it’s with extreme dread that she makes the trek to the Southern Shed twice every week.

“It’s not that bad,” Shinpachi wheedles. “And we’re almost done with this one. We would have finished ten minutes before if you’d got to grinding the nails earlier-“

“ _Alright,_ Pachi,” Kagura snaps, aggressively emptying their given pouch of nails into the stone mortar. A suspicious purple ooze lies along the bottom of it, but it had been her responsibility to clean up their utensils before class, so she takes care not to point it out. Much to her dismay, however, mashing the pestle into the mixture creates painfully obvious squelching sounds, and Shinpachi's eyes widen in alarm.

Kagura speeds up her motions. “You were not paying attention either, yes?" she accuses, speaking loudly over the wet noise. "All that stuff about a teacher pushing you into a bush has nothing to do with our potion.”

Shinpachi immediately forgets about the nails. “I just wanted to tell you a weird story,” he recoils, offended. “And it wasn’t a teacher either! It was Yamazaki-Senpai.”

Now that Kagura is paying attention, she has to concede that it is a little weird. “You mean Jimmy?” she asks, and Shinpachi rolls his eyes. “That’s funny.”

“Why?”

Kagura shrugs, relaxing as she finishes up the grinding of the nails. She’s managed to get them into a state of somewhat fine powder, but they’ve mixed into the ooze to create a strange shiny blob. Before Shinpachi can see, she tips it into the cauldron. “This was last Saturday, yes?" she asks, peering into the pot. “He crashed into me at the door of the North Building around the same time you said this happened, yup. He looked like he was in a hurry.” 

She watches their Scalding Solution hiss and bubble in almost violent protest. It quickly deteriorates into a shade of sickly yellow, and making a face, she leans back to allow Shinpachi to also take a look. He winces at the sight. “That does not look like egg-yolk orange,” he remarks, but continues hopefully, “Maybe it’ll look better after we stir it.” 

“Check the instructions.”

Shinpachi does so immediately, busily consulting their textbook. He tells her, “It says stir twice clockwise, twenty-three times anti clockwise.” 

She curses, picking up a spoon. While she gets to it, Shinpachi adds, “He must have bumped into you after I met him. I wonder what was so urgent.”

“Who knows?” Kagura grumbles, but after this, their conversation is put on hold so that she can methodically count the required rotations without being distracted. Shinpachi looks on, dropping in his leech pieces one by one as she does so, but at the end of it, their potion still resembles expired milk more than anything. 

They stare dejectedly at their botched creation. For lack of anything better to say, Kagura tells him, “I think I added an extra spin.”

Shinpachi sighs. “It’s close enough,” he says, and shuts the textbook. “I don’t know enough about solutions to try and fix it. Let’s just bottle it up.”

Kagura leaves Shinpachi with the more time-consuming job of clearing up their bench and hands over a vial of their off-yellow potion to Otose, who raises an eyebrow at its color but otherwise raises no objections. She permits them to go, and Kagura almost drags Shinpachi out of the classroom.

She flings open the doors, howling, “We’re free!”

“I heard that, brat!” Otose yells after them.

Shinpachi shunts a laughing Kagura along the grass path leading up from the Southern Shed. “Bye, Sensei!” he shouts back, and the doors of the crooked tower close behind them with a bang. They begin the long journey up from the bottom of the mountain to the North Building for lunch, making it up to the Palace without once bringing up Yamazaki’s strange behavior until they reach the very same doorway Kagura had run into him the previous week, where she is quick to point out the exact spot of the incident.

Shinpachi stops and looks around. “He _was_ chasing after Gin-san," he says thoughtfully. "Maybe something happened?”

Kagura shrugs. "Maybe," she allows, hearing footsteps. Almost as if on cue, she spots a familiar face coming down the stairs. “Let's ask,” she grins, and moves to cut the boy off at the landing. 

“Oi, Sadist!”

Okita Sougo looks up and comes to a stop at the bottom step, although any satisfaction to be felt at his compliance is immediately dashed upon Kagura realising that the staircase only serves to add to his already advantageous height. Her feeling of triumph is quick to morph into that of annoyance. 

She stops before him. “You like to hang around with that dumb Student Council, yes?" At his raised eyebrow, she presses, "What’s wrong with Jimmy? He was acting even weirder than usual last week.”

Shinpachi catches up to her as Sougo makes a face. “Zaki? What do you care about him?”

Kagura turns up her nose. “Shinpachi and I were assaulted.”

“Assaulted,” Sougo repeats, and with a rather nasty grin, asks, “You sure it wasn’t the other way around?”

Kagura's mouth opens in indignant rage, prompting Shinpachi to swiftly step in and cut her off. “We were just curious, Okita-san,” he says, trying for a placating smile, but appearing constipated instead. “It was very out of character for him.”

“He’s a freak, Glasses. Nothing is out of character for him.”

Kagura jostles Shinpachi to the side. “Just answer the question before I do something mean, Sadist!”

Sougo scoffs. “And what do I get from telling you?”

“A free pass into the main hall instead of a trip to the infirmary, yes?”

Boldly, he steps down to meet Kagura at level, and almost immediately, their charged pretense of civility snaps. “You going do something, brat?" he asks lowly, standing a hand's breath apart. "Go for it – I _dare_ you.”

Even without the extra height of the stairs, Sougo easily towers over her, and Kagura is annoyed to find she must look up in order to spit back, “Huh? Big words from a dumb chihuahua. You sure you don’t want to go crying to your nee-chan like last time?”

Sougo slams his forehead down on her own and they stand at stalemate, teeth bared in twin maniacal grins before Shinpachi hurriedly intervenes, forcing them both apart. 

“Cut it out!” he pleads, tugging Kagura back. “Why do you two always have to fight?”

“Let me go, Shinpachi! He started it!”

“Well, I’m ending it!”

Kagura wrenches her arm out of Shinpachi’s grip and throws Sougo a poisonous glare, though he doesn’t seem to notice. He’s making an expression akin to a child having been denied a toy, but he evenly reshoulders his book bag and takes a step back. “Whatever," he says cooly, not looking at Kagura at all. "I was doing you a favor, since the infirmary is where you need to go anyway – but I guess you aren’t that interested in talking to Zaki after all.”

Shinpachi, still acting as a barrier between them, looks back at Sougo in surprise. “Yamazaki-Senpai is in the infirmary? For what?”

Sougo shrugs. “Fainting? The shock of solving a Mahoutokoro mystery must have been too much for him.”

Shinpachi reels back. “A Mahoutokoro Mystery?!” he voices in shock, at the same time Kagura says, “No way!”

Sougo, sensing her interest like a shark picking up blood, grins smugly. "Well - it’s to be expected of the Student Council.”

That stuns Kagura more than anything. “The _Council?_ ” she repeats, disgusted. “What did _they_ do?! You just said Jimmy was the one who solved it, yes!”

“ _Jimmy,_ who is official investigator,” Sougo puts in, clearly relishing in her annoyance. “Now would be a good time to admit we’re awesome, China.”

Kagura scoffs. “You’re not even a member, yes? As if I care what those bastards do!”

They take a threatening step closer. He continues, "Either way, the Council will still go down in history as the first to have solved a Mahoutokoro Mystery."

"The Council can stick it," Kagura sneers. "Any idiot could solve one if they tried, yes!"

"Oh?" he taunts, and once again, they meet in the middle, magic spitting and boiling from their fingertips. "You're saying you could solve one? Right now?"

This time, Kagura is the one to slam her forehead into his. "Who do you think I am, huh?! Gura-san can do anything! And definitely a hundred times faster and better than you, yes!"

Sougo grins, the point of his teeth an inch away from slicing her lip. "Fine – a competition. The first to solve a mystery of my choosing wins the prize of commanding the loser as their slave for a week.”

 _A trap,_ Kagura thinks. Sougo sees it in her eyes. “You said you could solve any mystery,” he jeers, and the crackling hiss of raw magic swells to a crescendo. “It should be easy. Unless-“

“Kagura-chan!“

“-You’re too scared.”

She snaps. “You're on, punk!”

_Bang!_

Shinpachi doesn’t shove them apart in time, and Kagura is forced a step back as the pent up magic held between them explodes in a shower of sparks and steam. Her friend tugs her out of the smoke, roughly wiping the vapor from his glasses as he does so.

"Honestly!" he coughs, and tries to flap away some of the fog with his sleeve. "The next fight you two get into will destroy the school!"

Though Kagura does not see Sougo take out his wand, she does see it flick through the fog, which in turn, shortly thins and disperses. Ignoring Shinpachi, he looks to Kagura and says, “I choose the one about Sakamoto’s wife." He grins when her mouth falls open. “May the best wizard win.”

He sweeps smoothly past her through the doors of the North building. Kagura regains control of her jaw. “That’s cheating!” she hollers after him, but he’s already gone. She's left in the middle of the empty Entrance Hall, fuming.

Shinpachi is kind enough to give her a moment of silence. Then, “You realise that was a trap.”

Kagura huffs, a guttural noise from the back of her throat. “Yes.”

He waits another minute. “You’re still going to try and solve it, aren’t you?”

She squares her shoulders and scowls. _“Yes,”_ she says, and spins around, beginning the short march up the grand staircase. Shinpachi watches her pityingly as she goes. He calls after her, “Do you even have a plan?” 

Her stomps echo down the stairs. “Yes!”

He deflates, shaking his head. “It had better be a good one,” he warns, but he follows her up the stairs. “Okita-san already has the advantage of being in Toppuu.”

“I _know,_ ” Kagura snaps, but she waits for Shinpachi at the top of the staircase, silently thankful for his loyalty. “But it’s better than nothing.”

“Does this plan finish before lunch is over?”

“No,” Kagura says, hauling Shinpachi up the last step. “But I asked Soyo-chan to save me some, yes. You can have some of my pudding.”

“How generous,” he says dryly. They turn left into a tall corridor, the walls paneled in rich brown wood. "Is that what your paper crane was about?"

Kagura runs a hand along the wall as they walk. "Soyo-chan always finishes before us," she confirms, silently counting. "And I knew they were making Wagyuu beef for lunch today, so I wanted to make sure I got some, yes."

"Wagyuu beef?" Shinpachi groans. "You only offered me pudding!"

Kagura waves him away. “Shut up – I’m concentrating.”

_”Hey.”_

“Thirteen,” she mutters, ignoring him. “Fourteen, fifteen-“

She stops. “Sixteen,” she says, and knocks twice on the panel beneath her hand. There is an audible click, and it swings open, revealing a narrow passageway lit yellow with floating lanterns.

“Just like Nobu-tasu said,” she says proudly, grinning at Shinpachi’s open-mouthed surprise. "Sixteen panels down from the Entrance Hall staircase. She told me it goes straight to the West Building, yes."

Shinpachi sighs. "It’s better than nothing,” he echoes.

They step into the passageway and the panel shuts behind them, casting the corridor into a warm darkness. With Kagura in the lead, they begin the long walk down the corridor.

“So?” Shinpachi asks, his voice echoing along the passageway. “Do you think Sakamoto Sensei’s wife is real?”

Kagura snorts and smacks away a lantern, watching it bob ahead of them. “Of course not. His beautiful wife who works in international trade? Nobody like that would marry an idiot like him, yes?”

“That’s rude, Kagura-chan.”

“It’s true! Nobody could stand that laughing every day, yup.”

Shinpachi makes a face but doesn’t argue the point. Kagura smacks away another lantern. She adds, “And anyway, it is easier to prove somebody doesn’t exist.”

Her friend shrugs. “I suppose,” he admits. “But Okita-san has it much better. Sakamoto is head of Toppuu – somebody from his house is bound to know. All he has to do is ask.”

Kagura privately agrees, but she refuses to give the Sadist the satisfaction. She straightens with newfound determination. “Even if he does, he won’t have proof, yes?"

Shinpachi glances sideways at her, surprised. She meets his eye and grins. "We will definitely solve this before that idiot!"

He raises an eyebrow. "Well," he allows, looking past her, "I guess you're right."

Kagura shakes his arm. "Come on, Shinpachi! We can do this!"

"Alright, alright!" he complains, though he's trying hard not to smile. "I agree with you! My arm hurts, let me go-"

She frowns. "You mean it? You really agree with me?"

"I mean it," he tells her, and because he knows she won't be appeased with only that, he adds with an amused roll of his eyes, "We can do this.”

Kagura beams, squeezing his elbow. "I am holding you to that, yes!"

* * *

“We can’t do this!” Shinpachi gapes, horrified. “ _This_ was your plan?! This is a terrible plan!”

“Better than nothing,” Kagura repeats in a sing-song voice, examining the lock on Sakamoto’s office door. “Do you think there is a ward on this lock?”

 _“Yes!”_ Shinpachi moans, clutching at his face. “Definitely yes! What if he’s in there? Can he hear us?!”

“We're fine,” Kagura says, straightening as she fishes for her wand in her pocket. “He always has lunch with Gin-chan on Tuesdays.”

“Oh, in _that_ case, it’s perfectly okay! We’ll just break into his office, no problem-“

“Uh-huh,” she responds, finally unearthing her wand. She takes a step back and looks the door up and down. “I think I can do this.”

“Do _what?"_

Kagura clears her throat, pointing her wand to the lock. "Jie kāi!"

It clicks, and Kagura reaches out to open the door. She grins. “That.”

“This isn't funny!” Shinpachi wails as she sweeps confidently into the office. “And we’re meant to practicing Japanese spells!”

Kagura waves him off. “That is the least of our problems, yes?” she remarks, turning about the room in awe. It's her first time seeing Sakamoto's office, and despite herself, she can't help but feel a little dazzled. At every wall, beautiful astronomical instruments glitter silver and gold from the square shelves that tower from floor to ceiling, each more delicate and lovely than the one beside it. "Who knew the idiot had so much cool stuff in his room," she says, lifting a shiny, golden astrolabe from its space.

"Kagura-chan!" Shinpachi hisses, buzzing by the door. "Put it back! He might find out we were in here!"

"He won't," Kagura says, turning the astrolabe over in her hands. "He's too dumb, yes."

"He's a _teacher!_ " he snaps, looking over his shoulder before nervously shuffling into the room. "And we’re going to be in so much trouble-"

Kagura rolls her eyes, but she puts the astrolabe back in its place. She hears Shinpachi reluctantly approach the desk and leaves him to it, bending over to examine a silver globe engraved in delicate constellations. She traces a finger over the thin lines, allowing her nail to catch at an intersection where they cross over with another. "You find anything?" she asks, spinning the globe.

She can almost feel Shinpachi’s glare. "You’ll break it,” he warns, and she glances sideways at him to stick out her tongue. He huffs, looking back at the desk. “Just a photo of him and Gin-san with some other people."

”Boring,” she says, but she drags her hand against the globe until it stops spinning and straightens, heading over to the desk. "Where?" she asks, and Shinpachi points her to a framed photo by the edge of the table. She picks it up, frowning at the moving figures. It's a group photo taken by the sea, and true to Shinpachi's word, Sakamoto and Gintoki stand in the middle with two others, the former bellowing his usual obnoxious laughter while the latter edges away from him as far as he can. He goes as far as to try and leave the frame, but he's roughly pulled back by the man standing furthest right every time he attempts to do so, a man Kagura is stunned to find she recognises.

"Papi?" she says, shocked.

Shinpachi, who’s attention had been drifting to the stack of parchment on the desk, startles, knocking his hand painfully against the edge of the desk. "Ouch!" he yelps, shaking it out. "What?"

"It's my Papi!" Kagura says, this time in a louder and more stunned voice. She shoves the photo into Shinpachi's face. "Look! Standing at the right!"

Shinpachi gawks at the photo beneath his nose, almost cross-eyed with the effort of trying. "Sakamoto-sensei knows your father?" he manages to ask. "How?"

Kagura takes the photo back, staring hard at her father as he shunts Gintoki back into the middle of the group, who in turn shakes his arm out, looking none too pleased. Umibouzu's thin hair is braided in a ragged plait over his shoulder, indicating that the photo must have been taken in the years before he went bald. As if hearing her thoughts, he carefully pats the top of his head as he looks over and says something to the woman standing beside Sakamoto, an action which finally draws Kagura's attention to the final figure of the photo standing furthest left. Young and beautiful, the woman glares at the camera with her arms crossed, pointedly ignoring Sakamoto's laughter. She too, seems somewhat familiar, but with the ocean wind blowing a tempest behind the group, it's difficult to place her face beneath her flying auburn hair.

Shinpachi looks over her shoulder, but his interest is not in the woman. "Look at Gin-san,” he observes disapprovingly. “He’s still the same.” 

Kagura sees what he means. At that moment, the Gintoki in the photo finally seems to lose his temper and he smacks Sakamoto upside the head, an oft-repeated action she’s seen him do multiple times. Sakamoto clutches his head and complains, which prompts the woman to finally turn to him and speak, her mouth shaping a vicious volley of sharp and punctuated words. She pushes her hair back from her face, irritated, finally allowing a clear glimpse of her features - and it clicks.

The photo frame slips out of Kagura's hands.

"Kagura-chan!" Shinpachi squawks, catching it in a clumsy fumble mid-air. "Don't just drop it! What're you thinking?!"

But Kagura doesn't hear. In her mind's eye, she sees every interaction she's had with her favorite cousin.

_That stupid man-_

_My idiot husband-_

_Bought fifty useless bags and laughed about it, can you believe-_

_His job? He's a teacher-_

"Mutsu-nee," Kagura says, horrified. "You _didn't."_

* * *

"Ahahaha!" Sakamoto laughs, later when they corner him in Gintoki's office. "She did!"

A stunned silence follows his proclamation, broken only by the sound of Gintoki casually flipping a magazine page. Kagura sinks into the floor, wide-eyed with shock. "But-" she looks helplessly back up at Shinpachi who weakly raises his hands. "But why?!" she wails, pulling down her cheeks. "She's so cool and you're so stupid!"

"Hey!"

Without looking up from his copy of Jump, Gintoki inputs, "She's right."

Sakamoto reels back from the other man, clutching the edge of the kotatsu they're seated at for support. "You too, Kintoki?!"

Shinpachi flashes him a sympathetic look. "Sorry, Sensei," he apologises. "We were just surprised to find you were actually married."

"And to my _cousin_ ," Kagura whimpers, rolling over to Gintoki's side. "I'm _related_ to him. Do something about it, Gin-chan!"

Gintoki scoffs. "What am I supposed to do?" he asks, flipping another page. "This is the first I've heard that Tatsuma even has a wife."

"Ahahaha! What are you saying, Kintoki? You were best man at my wedding!"

"I've never been to any wedding, ever."

"You organised my bachelor party-"

"I've never thrown _anybody_ a bachelor party."

"It was four years ago!"

"Tatsuma, you don't have a wife-"

Kagura huffs, sitting up and looking to Shinpachi with an accusing pout. He shrugs and helps her up, and they leave Gintoki's office, their teachers too busy arguing to even notice. They walk to their next class. 

"Cheer up, Kagura-chan," Shinpachi consoles, patting her shoulder. "It could be worse."

Kagura purses her lips. "It can't. My coolest cousin is married to an idiot, yes. And she _loves_ him. I've failed as her family."

"That's a bit dramatic."

She moans, clutching at her hair. "It's _true!_ How am I supposed to look her in the eye now? Her husband gives me _homework_ -"

"Look at it this way," Shinpachi interrupts. "You've won your competition with Okita-san! He chose this mystery knowing it would be easier for him to solve, but you did it before him anyway! Isn't that great?"

Kagura shoots her friend a pathetic glare, but something about his infectious enthusiasm wears her down. "I guess," she eventually grumbles. "And the Sadist said himself that loser would have to be a slave for a week..."

Shinpachi suddenly adopts a disapproving expression. "You won't make him do weird things right?"

She grins a little. "Maybe I'll order him to run around naked for a whole day." But Shinpachi merely raises a suspicious eyebrow at this, and she amends hurriedly, "Or just make him do all my homework, yes?"

He rolls his eyes, pushing up his glasses. "Our studies aren't even that hard, Kagura-chan."

Kagura opens her mouth to argue, but a thought suddenly dawns on her. "You're right," she says in surprise, causing Shinpachi to immediately look back at her in shock. She continues slowly, "He also never said when the loser had to start their week of slavery, yes?"

Shinpachi sees what she's insinuating, and an unbidden half-laugh escapes him. "Kagura-chan, even you can't keep it up for _that_ long."

But she feels quite the opposite. As they exit the West Building, Kagura turns her face up to the blue sky and envisions a sweet revenge. She'd make the Sadist wait just a little longer.

Kagura grins. "I say we keep our slave for a rainy day."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dear Sorachi,
> 
> I started watching Gintama around the beginning of my high school exams, which was just about the worst time to get into it, but I don't regret a thing. I was introduced to a ridiculous world filled with an amazing cast and equally as amazing stories, all of which inspired me to write the Gintama fanfic I do now. Your manga wormed its way into my heart and now holds the top spot for best anime/manga I've watched/read. It was funny, it was dumb, it was beautiful, it was heartbreaking. But most importantly, it taught me that home isn't a place - it's the family you make.
> 
> I'll carry the mantra 'Zura janai, Katsura da,' to my grave.
> 
> Thanks Gorilla-Sensei.
> 
> Love, Arasei <3
> 
> P.S. I NEED TO CRY ABOUT THE ENDING W/ SOMEBODY, IF YOU GUYS ARE READING THIS PLZ MESSAGE ME


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